Arms and the Women
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- $25.99
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- $25.99
Publisher Description
‘Luminously written, thrilling, unexpectedly erudite, and beautifully structured’ Geoffrey Wansell, Daily Mail
When Ellie Pascoe finds herself under threat, her husband DCI Peter Pascoe and Superintendent Andy Dalziel assume it’s because she’s married to a cop.
While they hunt down the source of the danger, Ellie heads out of town in search of a haven… only to get tangled up in a conspiracy involving Irish arms, Colombian drugs and men who will stop at nothing to achieve their ends.
Dalziel eventually concludes the security services are involved, but by then it is too late. Ellie’s on her own – and must dig deep down into her reserves to survive…
Reviews
‘Few writers in the genre today have Hill’s gifts: formidable intelligence, quick humour, compassion and a prose style that blends elegance and grace’ Donna Leon, Sunday Times
‘The fertility of Hill’s imagination, the range of his power, the sheer quality of his literary style never cease to delight’ Val McDermid, Sunday Express
‘He is probably the best living male crime writer in the English-speaking world’ Andrew Taylor, Independent
‘Reginald Hill’s novels are really dances to the music of time, his heroes and villains interconnecting, their stories entwining’ Ian Rankin, Scotland on Sunday
‘An increasingly lyrical and always humorous writer, he is first and foremost an instinctive and complete novelist who is blessed with a spontaneous storytelling gift’ Francis Fyfield, Mail On Sunday
About the author
Reginald Hill was born and brought up in Cumbria, and has returned there after many years in Yorkshire. With his first crime novel, A Clubbable Woman, he was hailed as ‘the crime novel’s best hope’ and, nearly thirty years on, he has more than fulfilled that prophecy
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Few mystery authors know better than the prolific Hill (Singing the Sadness, Forecasts, Aug. 23) how to keep the delicate engine of a high-quality series running. After successfully mining the past for his last two books about Yorkshire coppers Andy Dalziel and Peter Pascoe (The Wood Beyond and On Beulah Height), he now takes an entirely new direction--centering the series' action on Pascoe's wife, Ellie, and surrounding her with a captivating gallery of mostly female characters. The result is a delightfully quirky, literate, often explosively funny novel that actually extends the genre's range. Ellie Pascoe--former activist and deeply involved teacher, now recovering from the serious medical threat to her nine-year-old daughter, Rosie, that was detailed in On Beulah Height--is a "pre-published" novelist working on a book about Odysseus (who in Ellie's hands sounds a lot like a Greek version of Fat Andy Dalziel, complete with Yorkshire vernacular). When a slick couple show up in an expensive car, claiming to be from the local education authority and offering to give her a lift to the spot where a bus carrying Rosie has broken down, Ellie almost goes along--escaping an abduction attempt only because of the deeply implanted suspicions of a cop's wife. Pascoe, Dalziel, the wonderfully resourceful Sgt. Edgar Wield and the extremely sharp Constable Shirley Novello try to link the attempted snatch to some of Pascoe's past cases and enemies, especially to the gorgeous money launderer Kelly Cornelius. Hill soon lets us know better, however, introducing a shadowy figure who calls herself Sybil and a wheelchair-bound intelligence gatherer working for a high-ranking spook. And there's also the Colombian drug bandits and Irish arms-runners who somehow figure into the attack on Ellie--and then in the assault on Ellie's marvelously acid, deceptively stiff-upper-lipped neighbor Daphne. Also vital to the plot is Feenie Macallum, the aged but doggedly energetic daughter of a legendary arms merchant, whose crumbling seaside estate provides the locale for the novel's amazing finale--a rare, perfect blend of danger and hilarity.
