The Big Killing - Softcover

Wilson, Robert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006513891 ISBN 13: 9780006513896

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1999

Synopsis

An evocative and atmospheric thriller set along the part of the African coast they used to call the White Man’s Grave, The Big Killing is the second novel to feature Bruce Medway.

Bruce Medway, go-between and fixer for traders in steamy West Africa, smells trouble when he’s approached by a porn merchant to deliver a video to a secret location. And just to add to his problems, BB, Medway’s rich Syrian patron, hires him to act as minder to Ron Collins – a spoilt playboy in Africa to buy diamonds – in the Ivory Coast.

All this could be the answer to his cashflow crisis, but when the video delivery leads to a shootout and the discovery of a mutilated body, Medway is more inclined to retreat to his bolthole in Benin – especially as the manner of the victim’s death is too similar to a current notorious political murder for comfort.

His obligations, though, keep him fixed in the Ivory Coast and he is soon caught up in a terrifying cycle of violence. But does it stem from the political upheavals in nearby Liberia, or from the cutthroat business of the diamonds? Unless Medway can get to the bottom of the mystery, he knows that for the savage killer out there in the African night, he is the next target...

About this title

Review:

‘If I come across as original and blackly funny a thriller again this year, I’ll feel myself double blest’
Irish Times

‘A class act’
Sunday Times

‘First in a field of one’
Literary Review

From the Back Cover:

Bruce Medway, go-between and fixer for traders in steamy West Africa, smells trouble when a porn merchant asks him to deliver a video at a secret location. Things look up, though, when he's hired to act as minder to Ron Collins – a spoilt playboy looking for diamonds – in the Ivory Coast. Medway thinks this could be the answer to his cashflow crisis, but when the video delivery leads to a shootout and the discovery of a mutilated body, the prospect of retreating to his bolthole in Benin becomes increasingly attractive – especially as the manner of the victim's death is too similar to a current notorious political murder for comfort.

His obligations, though, keep him fixed in the Ivory Coast and he is soon caught up in a terrifying cycle of violence. But does it stem from the political upheavals in nearby Liberia, or from the cut-throat business of diamonds? Unless Medway can get to the bottom of the mystery, he know that for the savage killer out there in the African night, he is the next target...

“The action is furious and the one-liners . . . would have made even Raymond Chandler jealous”
SUNDAY TIMES

“If I come across as original and blackly funny a thriller again this year, I’ll feel myself doubly blest”
IRISH TIMES

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0006513891
• ISBN 13: 9780006513896
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304