As this is the fourth book in the DS Max Craigie series and I hadn’t read any of the earlier ones, I did wonder whether I might find it difficult to fully-appreciate (and enjoy!) this one as a stand-alone story. However, I needn’t have worried as there were enough clues given to fill in some of the shared history of the investigating team and I very quickly became absorbed in this fast-moving, tension-filled story. In part this was because it soon became clear that the author had very effectively used his police background (military police, working as a detective with London’s Metropolitan Police and his experiences as a covert policing specialist) to ensure an authentic ring of truth about all aspects of the developing plot, police procedures, the complications which can occur when different professional agencies are involved in a case. The portrayal of the team’s increasingly complex investigation into the disappearance of fifteen-year-old Affi, who as a twelve-year-old had been trafficked by an Albanian gang and used as a drugs mule before being rescued and given a supposedly safe new identity with a loving foster family, offered a chilling insight into the lengths criminal gangs are prepared to go to in order to protect their ‘assets’ and to terrorise their vulnerable victims into compliance and silence by threatening to harm those they love most.
The inclusion of some very dark, but sadly all too familiar, themes in the story (people trafficking, using children as drug-mules, forced prostitution of under-age girls, gratuitous violence and torture inflicted by vicious sadists, corruption in the police force etc) made this at times a very disturbing story to read, occasionally to the point where I found the escalating tension almost unbearable. However, one of the things I enjoyed most about the author’s storytelling was his timely introduction of some lighter, humorous moments just in time to rescue me from the inherent darkness of the storyline. These came mainly though the interactions of the various members of DS Max Craigie’s team, a diverse group of characters who had clearly found a way to balance out individual foibles and to work together effectively in their quest for justice. Another balancing factor came through the portrayal of Affi’s loving and supportive foster parents and the role they played in offering a secure home to a vulnerable child and showing her that she could leave the past behind and have a better future.
I enjoyed the inclusion of police procedural elements, the important role of forensics in solving crimes, the complex world of cyber-crime and the equally complex use of technological advances to tackle this scourge. All these elements contributed an important dimension to this enjoyable and engaging thriller … as did the author’s inclusion of some highly-evocative Scottish vernacular!
The inclusion of some very dark, but sadly all too familiar, themes in the story (people trafficking, using children as drug-mules, forced prostitution of under-age girls, gratuitous violence and torture inflicted by vicious sadists, corruption in the police force etc) made this at times a very disturbing story to read, occasionally to the point where I found the escalating tension almost unbearable. However, one of the things I enjoyed most about the author’s storytelling was his timely introduction of some lighter, humorous moments just in time to rescue me from the inherent darkness of the storyline. These came mainly though the interactions of the various members of DS Max Craigie’s team, a diverse group of characters who had clearly found a way to balance out individual foibles and to work together effectively in their quest for justice. Another balancing factor came through the portrayal of Affi’s loving and supportive foster parents and the role they played in offering a secure home to a vulnerable child and showing her that she could leave the past behind and have a better future.
I enjoyed the inclusion of police procedural elements, the important role of forensics in solving crimes, the complex world of cyber-crime and the equally complex use of technological advances to tackle this scourge. All these elements contributed an important dimension to this enjoyable and engaging thriller … as did the author’s inclusion of some highly-evocative Scottish vernacular!