Alive and Kicking: No Exit 18 Promo - Softcover

Milne, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1842431560 ISBN 13: 9781842431566

Publisher: No Exit Press, 2005

Synopsis

Jimmy Jenner has been working as a private detective since a terrorist bomb took both his leg and his job on London’s police force. He’s been hired to work on a straightforward divorce case, but the stakes are quickly raised. First someone tries to murder a man who resembles Jenner, then the subject of his divorce investigation is found dead in Epping Forest. Jenner soon realizes he’s the catalyst in these events. And so he begins to question his own past, particularly the accidental death of his brother Joe, 30 years earlier. Joe was a minor criminal, a peripheral member of the circle of South London gangster, Tommy Slaughter. Was Joe’s death what it seemed at the time? The answer may explain the violence now closing in on Jimmy Jenner.

About this title

Review:

Award-winning John Milne is one of the grittier British heirs of the Chandler tradition; his bitter ex- policeman hero, Jimmy Jenner, stalks the streets of South London, short of a leg from an IRA bomb. Jenner's wife stayed on the force and has left him for a high flier; times are hard and someone is taking potshots at cars that look like his. Jenner is damaged goods, but has an attractive determination to make sense of his confusing world.

Everything for once does tie up; the suburban adulterer he is following is there when a reformed gangster is shot and his ex-wife's fiancé is altogether too interested in what is going on. Jenner's elder brother, a minor league hoodlum, died horribly and pointlessly when buried alive 30 years ago, and this too ties up with the events of the present. The question is whether Jenner can avoid joining him.

Milne makes Jenner attractive by giving him a tough, unsentimental attitude to London crime and a sense of being adrift: wanting to be Philip Marlowe in a world that expects him to be a "New Lad" or a yuppy. For once, the detective learns less by detection and more by understanding his own heart. --Roz Kaveney

Synopsis:

Jimmy Jenner has been working as a private detective since a terrorist bomb caused him to lose a leg, and his job on London's police force. He is hired to work on a straightforward divorce case, but the stakes are soon raised. Someone tries to murder a man resembling Jenner outside his local pub, then the subject of his divorce enquiries is found dead in Epping forest. Jenner comes to realise he is himself a catalyst in these events. He has to question his own past, especially his family history and the accidental death of his elder brother, Joe, thirty years before. Joe was a minor criminal and peripheral member of the circle of murdered South London gangster, Tommy Slaughter. Was Joe's death what it seemed at the time? The answer may explain the violent events surrounding Jimmy Jenner now.

About this edition

• Publisher: No Exit Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 1842431560
• ISBN 13: 9781842431566
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288