The Last Train to Scarborough (Jim Stringer) - Softcover

Martin, Andrew

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571229700 ISBN 13: 9780571229703

Publisher: Faber & Faber, 2010

Synopsis

One night, in a private boarding house in Scarborough, a railwayman vanishes, leaving his belongings behind...

It is the eve of the Great War, and Jim Stringer, railway detective, is uneasy about his next assignment. It's not so much the prospect Scarborough in the gloomy off-season that bothers him, or even the fact that the last railwayman to stay in the house has disappeared without trace. It's more that his governer, Chief Inspector Saul Weatherhill, seems to be deliberately holding back details of the case - and that he's been sent to Scarborough with a trigger-happy assistant. And when Jim encounters the seductive and beautiful Amanda Rickerby a whole new personal danger enters Jim's life...

About this title

Review:

In such books as The Necropolis Railway and The Blackpool Highflyer, Andrew Martin forged something highly original in the historical crime field (no easy task): the author’s adroit evocation of the great age of the steam locomotive was the perfect backdrop for crime narratives of genuine panache, and this long-distant (but fondly remembered) world is conjured with a consummate skill. The new book, The Last Train to Scarborough, is proof that Martin’s skills are as sharply honed as ever, and (thankfully) he has not been distracted by his burgeoning second career as an authority on household management (!) – a second career that the drily sardonic author seems bemused by.

The Last Train to Scarborough, Andrew Martin’s new excursion into the Edwardian past, has his resourceful ex-railway-worker-turned-detective Jim Stringer tackling an assignment he is not comfortable with: he is to take lodgings in a dismal off-season Scarborough. Jim is to stay at a house called (ironically) 'Paradise’, from which the last railwayman to stay there has mysteriously vanished. What is it that Jim Stringer’s chief inspector isn’t telling him about the case? And two other questions soon become very pressing: will the beguiling Amanda Rickerby put a spoke in Jim Stringer’s marriage? And will Stringer himself ever be riding the railway back to his York haunts again?

As before, this is delicious stuff, showing not an iota of tiredness with the railway detective scenario. The author’s obvious love for his atmospheric milieu, his period – and his characters – pays dividends once again. --Barry Forshaw

Book Description:

The Last Train to Scarborough is the latest charming and atmospheric mystery for Andrew Martin's celebrated 'Steam Detective' Jim Stringer.

About this edition

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 0571229700
• ISBN 13: 9780571229703
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 320