The Crime Warp

Tony Lee Moral is the author of Playing Mrs Kingston, a novel inspired by Alfred Hitchcock. Alfred Hitchcock had the greatest of all things, a story to tell. In finding ideas to adapt to film and television, he often turned to newspaper articles, short stories, plays and novels. Audiences knew that with a Hitchcock story they would have a good time, they may be frightened, or they may be amused, as Hitchcock had an individual personality as a storyteller. As the author of three books on the Master of Suspense, including a ‘how to’ write a thriller, called Alfred Hitchcock’s Movie Making Masterclass, I was naturally inspired by his stories when constructing my crime novel, Playing Mrs. Kingston, particularly Strangers on a Train and The Wrong Man. For Hitchcock, the themes behind his thrillers must blend two important elements. Firstly, they should hang on one central idea that the audience or reader must always be thinking about. A good story should state in the f...

The Final Minute by Simon Kernick races along at breakneck speed.  It's exciting, bold and  sexy and I promise that once you've opened it, you'll just keep on reading till the last page.

Wow, wow, wow, I've just finished Mel Sherratt’s latest Allie Shenton novel, Only the Brave, and it's a great read. This is Mel’s seventh book, and her third in the Allie Shenton series. Following on from the fabulous Taunting the Dead, and Follow the Leader, one of my top five books this year, I was worried that this one would be disappointing, but right from the first page my fears were allayed.  I've  said it before, and I’ll say it again, Mel’s books just get better and better. When DS Allie Shenton begins investigating the death of Jordan Johnson her world is thrown into turmoil, not only does she have to deal with notorious villain Terry Ryder and his spoilt daughter Kirstie again, but she is also being stalked by the man who attacked her sister seventeen years ago, and left her for dead. The character of Allie is more convincing with each new offering.  The gamut of emotions Mel takes us through in this narrative is astounding: I went from laug...

After three long years hunting for a two serial killer's working together, detectives are still clueless and worse the body count is increasing.  The only link between the murders is the fact that the killers leave something behind each time.

I’ve never read a Tony Parsons novel before but I definitely will in the future. This novel had me gripped from the beginning. The action never stops in this book. The plot moves at breakneck speed as the MIT (murder investigation team), race to catch a killer/kidnapper before it's too late to save the life of a young boy. A murdered family. A dying serial killer. A missing child. And a detective who must learn that even the happiest of families have black, twisted secrets that someone is ready to kill for… A family are brutally murdered on New Year’s Eve in one of London’s most exclusive gated communities. The youngest child, 4 year old Bradley, is missing.  The killer used a cattle gun, an unusual murder weapon, which leads Max Wolfe and the MIT to the Slaughter Man, a dying serial killer, a man who has killed this way before.    Max Wolfe is a hero I want to read about again and again. Tony Parsons has created a character with real depth, there are s...

YOU ARE DEAD – RESEARCH NOTES by Peter James 12/05/15   We can understand the motives of many murderers.  A loved one killed in a fit of jealous rage, a ruthless armed robber who shoots out of greed, the terrorist who kills out of warped ideology, the professional hit man who kills for a fee, the husband who buries his wife beneath the kitchen floor because he’s fallen in love with someone else…  But what about the serial killer?

In Brighton, a thirty year old woman's skeleton is found under a path during building work and a young man hears the abduction of his fiance from the underground car park of their flats.  Superintendent Roy Grace soon begins to suspect the two cases are linked, when similarities in the descriptions of the young women and a further abduction are discovered.  

From cinema releases Big Game , a comedy, action adventure (Release date 8th May) to the serious kick ass British made Spooks: The Greater Good  (release date 8th May) and TV crime drama's from Channel 4's (Tuesday's 9 PM) gritty down to earth police drama No Offence to BBC2's spy thriller The Game   (Thursday's 9 PM)  we're spoiled for choice this early summer time.

Amos Decker has suffered two severely traumatic events in his life.  First, he died and was resuscitated twice on the football  pitch after a  tackle gone wrong. This resulted in a brain injury which left him with hyperthymesia (the ability to remember everything he's ever seen read heard or experienced) and synthesia where everyday experiences become linked to colours and numbers. The second trauma was finding the bodies of his murdered wife and child .

For the spring summer commutes I've got a few goodies lined up in the form of short stories.   I've included a couple of the Broadchurch shorts (linked to series two) a couple of PD Viner's short stories , a Tony Parsons, a Karin Slaughter and a Peter James short story collection.

Have you ever listened to the radio where the DJ phones a number at random and if the person replying answers with the correct catchphrase they win a prize? That’s the format on 101.5FM in Berlin, except this morning the format has changed.   A gunman takes hostages at the radio station and rewrites the rules – if the answer is “I listen to 101.5, set a hostage free” then a hostage goes free – if not he’ll shoot one of the hostages and repeat the game every 30 minutes.  The gunman, Jan May was previously told his fiancée was killed in a car crash, yet he was speaking to her on the phone as the policeman arrived to deliver the news.   May is thwarted at every turn to find the truth - framed for drug possession and falsely accused of sexual assault on one of his patients, May has decided that this is the only way to find the truth.       May comes up against Ira Samin, a criminal psychologist and hostage negotiator battling her own demons ...

  This novel starts with a bang – literally!   Detectives Sinclair and Alvarez are called to deal with the aftermath of a third bomb blast in twenty four hours.   Mayhem reigns in Abraham City, in the religious heartland of America.   Peter Gudsen is dead, Bobbi Lomax a seemingly random victim blown apart by the second bomb and now Cark Houseman, a dealer in rare books, critically injured and fighting for his life. Sinclair and Alvarez are digging for a motive and the link between these unconnected victims.   Soon links pop up – Bobbi Lomax’s husband Arnold was involved in a property development deal that collapsed and left many angry creditors.   This seems as better motive than revenge by Arnold Lomax’s bitter ex wife.   All the victims have some connections with “The Faith”, a religious organisation with all the hallmarks of a cult, but so do many people in this small town.   The key seems to be the links between Gudsen, Lomax and ...