Review of Runaway by Peter May (2015, Quercus)

1965 and five teenage band members runaway to London to pursue their dream of making it big in the music industry.  The trip starts to go wrong not long after leaving Glasgow and by the time they’re in London their skint, wanted by the law, and have Rachel, the lead singer’s cousin, in tow.  By chance they end up in the company of a socialite doctor and his circle of celebrity friends, but their friendship is coming under strain and their dreams lie in tatters.  2015 and Maurie is dying of cancer, Jack is a widower, and Dave is an alcoholic whose wife has left him.  All three have led lives of regret and under-achievement, their runaway adventure still being the highlight of their lives; all three still dream of how life could have turned out differently, especially for the band member who didn’t return home.  When Maurie spots a newspaper story detailing the death of a former actor, who’s been on the run since they last saw him, he’s determined to head back to London before he dies to resolve unfinished business, accompanied by his old friends.

In Runaway Peter May juxtaposes a coming of age tale set in 1965, and its hope, faith, growing pains and hard lessons, with an end of life tale set in 2015, and its regrets, disappointments, and nostalgia.  What links the two together is a singular event - running away to London from Glasgow - that is both the highest and lowest point of the main character’s life and still casts a powerful shadow over him.  The tale is told from the perspective of Jack Mackay, split into a present day narrative told in the third person, and a historical narrative told in the first person.  This works well, allowing the two time periods to inform and mirror each other, as Jack and two his band mates retrace their steps fifty years later.  The strength of the story are the principal characters and their interactions.  The plot is relatively straightforward, telling in parallel the two road-trip adventures to London, and is notable more for its exposition of friendship, life’s journeys and nostalgia, than its crime or mystery elements.  Indeed, the tension in the story is generated more through rifts in the group and between family members than by sinister elements in the plot.  The overall effect is a story that is interesting and entertaining, but which never really turned into a page-turner due to its predictable outcome and pacing.

Review of Entry Island by Peter May (Quercus, 2014)

Sime Mackenzie, a detective based in Montreal, has recently separated from his wife and is suffering from chronic insomnia.  Given he’s a fluent English speaker in a mostly French-speaking force he is assigned to a team, that includes his wife, a crime scene investigator, being flown to the Magdalen Islands in the Gulf of St Lawrence to investigate the murder of rich businessman on the remote Entry Island, stabbed to death in his own home.  Kirsty Cowell claims that she was attacked by a man wearing a ski mask, who killed her husband when he intervened.  Circumstantial evidence, however, suggests that she was her husband’s killer.  Lieutenant Crozes, who's charge of the investigative team, wants to wrap the case up quickly and is happy to take the obvious route.  Sime, however, senses that they are making a mistake, but his judgement is clouded by an acute lack of sleep, the presence of his estranged wife, and a sense that he shares a connection to Kirsty Cowell even though he’s never met her before.

In Entry Island, Peter May weaves together two stories, separated by almost two centuries -- a murder investigation on a remote island in the Gulf of St Lawrence and a doomed love affair on the Isle of Lewis between a crofter’s son and the daughter of the local laird.  The intertwining of the stories is nicely done, providing some interesting counterpoints between the two periods and how the past intervenes in the present.  Whilst the Lewis story is compelling, the present day investigation is less satisfactory, with a little too much melodrama at times, a rather contrived personal situation, a weak investigative plot that relies on the team ignoring evidence, including a second death and an attempted murder, and a resolution that didn’t ring true.   Nonetheless, some of the telling is very good, producing a page-turning read, with nice historical contextualisation concerning the Highland clearances and emigration to Canada, and a strong sense of place in Scotland and Canada.  The result is a story that is a little uneven, with a somewhat weak ending, but is still an engaging and entertaining read.

Review of The Black House by Peter May (Quercus, 2011)

Detective Inspector Fin Macleod grew up in a remote village on the Isle of Lewis, escaping the cloying, conservative society to Glasgow University when he was 18.  Within a year he had dropped out and joined the police.  Seventeen years later and his life is in a rut.  His marriage is on the rocks and his eight year old son has recently been killed in a hit and run incident.  On the verge of leaving the police he is sent back to Lewis to help in the murder investigation of one of his former class mates, killed in the same way as a victim in one of his open cases in Edinburgh.  Neither Macleod or the DCI in charge of the case wants him there.  As MacLeod starts to investigate he uncovers old memories and encounters ghosts from his past.  As the case unfolds, it twists in a sinister fashion, Macleod becoming ever more uncomfortable as his past catches up with him. 

The Black House is written in expressive prose that’s very easy on the eye.  The sense of place, the characterization, and the close community relations are very well done, placing the reader into the landscape and society of Lewis.  The telling alternates between the present, told in the third person, and flash backs to Macleod’s childhood, told in the present tense.  It’s a plot device that works well, providing vital contextual back story.  Unfortunately, it is also over elaborated and it would have been possible to trim much of it back in length without losing any important material.  Certainly 50 plus pages could be edited from the book without the story suffering in any great way.  The other main issue is the telegraphing of the mystery element of the plot.  By a third of the way through I’d worked out who the killer was and roughly why; I was holding out for a major plot twist, but although a twist did come it was one that confirmed my deduction rather than challenged it.  All in all, a nicely written book that provides an interesting tale with a strong sense of place and community, but is overly long and has a weak plot with respect to the murder investigation though not Macleod’s personal history.