Another cracking murder mystery for DI Tom Thorne

I put my hand up for the English crime novel, Love Like Blood by Mark Billingham, the fourteenth episode in the life of DI Tom Thorne. The blurb sounded interesting and, as I hadn’t read any of the first thirteen, I thought I’d see what the now lengthy series could provide by way of entertainment.

So, how did I find it? Pretty good reading, in fact!

Billingham’s writing is satisfying because he uses generally crisp language and a constantly developing storyline that twists and turns to keep readers on their mental toes. Inevitably, there are a number of red herrings, too, essential in a murder thriller. Despite the book’s name, and with a couple of exceptions, one at the very beginning and another near the end, the story has little in the way of visceral shock.

It seems DI Nicola Tanner has got too close to cracking what she considers ‘honour killings’ within the London Asian community. Her car parks outside her home at night. Two intruders run forward and kill the woman they believe to be her although it is, in fact, her partner, Susan Best who dies. Withdrawn from the case because of personal involvement, placed on compassionate leave, Tanner approaches fellow DI Tom Thorne to take up where she was made to leave off.

From this point, things could get a bit messy, but Billingham handles his script and his people with consummate skill. Other officers are conducting further inquiries into Tanner’s case in her absence, and by asking Thorne to step in, on the quiet, she is breaching police procedures. Still, one of Thorne’s cold cases is not dissimilar to those she has been investigating and he’s been known to step a bit wide of normal practices in the past. Thorne manages to combine the two lines of enquiry… but is he heading in the right direction despite the appearance of progress?

We know from the early pages of the book who the actual murderers are, hired hit men who appear regularly throughout the pages.  Muldoon is a big, pathological Irishman who loves to hurt, with a primal joy in what he does. His partner is a small, alert Asian, Riaz, quieter and outwardly more couth, someone who kills for the sake of helping others maintain family honour. He sees his work as fulfilling.

A young Bangladeshi couple, Kamal Azim and Amaya Shah disappear. It appears that, although both have been promised by their families to others, they are planning an illicit affair. During the investigation, a train passenger’s phone video is shown on public media, a big man haranguing them on a train, with a smaller man seemingly coming to their assistance; later, CCTV shows them leaving a train a couple of stops short of their destination accompanied by the small man. The big man follows.

A few days later, Amaya’s body is found but there is no sign of Kamal. There are two main scenarios considered: Kamal murdered Amaya and is on the run (this the official direction), or both have been killed at the behest of their families for breaking family honour (a more likely circumstance, according to Thorne and Tanner).

Thorne’s good friend, the pierced, pool playing and overtly homosexual Phil Hendricks, is the pathologist who performs the post mortem on Amaya. He finds evidence that seriously jeopardises the direction of the Thorne and Tanner case, already seemingly skating on thin ice. Undeterred, they redouble their push to establish links to family and community.

They attend and appear to harass the Anti Hate Crime Alliance, or AHCA, regular gatherings open to all in the Sikh, Hindu and Muslim communities. Members appear sincere enough in their intent, but is there anything suspicious in their leadership or, perhaps, in those just a step below the top? And what of the man in the gold skull cap?

Parallel to the investigative side of the story is Thorne’s relationship with Helen. Helen’s work in the field of family abuse has her probing the case of two boys, twelve and fourteen. Incredibly, her findings have a bearing on Thorne’s case. This is where Billingham’s writing shows its strength. In a circumstance with the potential to become somewhat tenuous, he works the two elements of the story together in a completely professional manner. 

Good reading for those who look to a good detective story for their reading entertainment… and for those who don’t, necessarily.  

Love Like Blood, by Mark Billingham (published by Hachette Australia) is available now from Dymocks. Click here to learn more.