- Hardcover: 224 pages
- Publisher: WW Norton; New edition edition (July 1 2005)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 039306042X
- ISBN-13: 978-0393060423
- Product Dimensions: 21.1 x 14.7 x 2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 318 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,243,205 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. An ongoing gentleman's war between cops and local drug dealers takes a deadly turn when someone firebombs the house of a smalltime dealer in James's stellar new Harpur and Iles mystery (Panicking Ralph, etc.). Is it one of the resident drug magnates, perhaps Panicking Ralph Ember or Mansel Shale, looking to take over complete control? Or are outside forces moving in again from London or elsewhere? As in an uneasy marriage, Harpur—superintendent of detectives in an unnamed British city—puts up with the vanity, jealousy and questionable moral behavior of his superior, assistant chief constable Iles. The dialogue between the two sizzles like small-scale lightning. "I see you as like General de Gaulle, sir—you know, waiting at Colombey les Deux Eglises for the call to put things right," Harpur replies when Iles asks him several deaths later if he's still on his side. James's loyal band of readers should appreciate the acid rain of his irony.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Fans of the prolific Welsh author's superb Harpur and Iles series have enjoyed watching him slowly explode the conventions of the police procedural. The ongoing saga of Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur, Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles, and the drug lords who occupy their particular patch of turf offers intrigue worthy of Shakespeare with humor worthy of the cult BBC-TV show, The Office. Harpur is a taciturn single father whose talkative older daughter has a crush on Iles, his nominal boss; Iles is a showboat prone to screaming fits about his wife's infidelities with Harpur. This time, culturally aspiring crooks Panicking Ralph and Manse Shale share equal billing with the cops, and the wonderfully monikered Sashaying Vernon plays a brief but memorable role. Iles' peace-through-accommodation strategy with Ember and Manse is nixed when a new, "enlightened" chief constable relaxes drug policy. With less heat, the big firms face extinction. Violence erupts, but who's behind it? A chauffeur who would be kingpin? Or a policeman looking to restore the status quo? This is a rich, rare treat, full of car-crash conversations and blind-spot interior monologues--but the blood is real enough when the actors forget to watch the road. Excellent and utterly unique. Keir Graff
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
5.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very strong addition to powerful series, Sep 25 2005
By booksforabuck "BooksForABuck" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Easy Street (Hardcover)
Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles has maintained a weird balance of enforcement and tolerance in his English city. Drug lords Ralph Embers and Manse Shale divide up the profits and minimize violence in exchange for the police looking the other way. But a change in policy, with the government officially relaxing its attitude toward drugs, means that prices tumble. And with falling prices, the drug alliances are shattered. There simply isn't enough profit to sustain everyone.From the street level up to the top of the chain, dealers look for the chance to consolidate, to achieve monopoly. Iles watches his long-time policy shatter into violence and, to Detective Chief Superintendent Harpur, at least, Iles seems to fall into the uncomfortable position long held by their former boss, Mark Lane. Iles begins to see symbols in every act.
'Panicking Ralph' Embers has had a profitable relationship with Manse Shale, but when Shale's lieutenant offers to kill Shale and work for Embers, the temptation is hard to turn down. Especially when Shale embarrasses himself with a flip-chart presentation. Meanwhile, Harpur virtually stumbles over a gunfight--and can't persuade anyone that it wasn't a setup from the start.
As with every Harpur and Iles story, there's more going on than author Bill James (...) reveals. Did Iles set up the murders in an attempt to persuade the government that their policy is flawed? Was the red Audi part of a police hit? Is Iles angling for a cut of the drug money with his retirement? Iles remains the spider at the center of a web that stretches into the unseen.
Author Bill James offers a dark and cynical view of policing. The line between good and evil, police and criminal, blurs to the point of invisibility. The dialogue between criminals, between Harpur and Iles, and between criminals and cops is filled with misdirection, with answering questions not asked, and with unexpected turns. There are plenty of laugh-out-loud moments, but the story is far from funny.
EASY STREETS is a very strong addition to the fascinating Harpur & Iles series.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
excellent Harper-Iles police procedural, July 6 2005
By Harriet Klausner - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Easy Street (Hardcover)
For years there was agreement between Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles and drug kingpins Mansel Shale and Panicking Ralph Ember. The cops would wink at their drug deals in return they would keep the streets safe and peaceful for the law abiding citizen. However, classic supply and demand economics takes root over time; surplus drugs become available in a risk free buyer's market leading to increase in small owner competition that eats at the oligopoly's dwindling profit margin.Someone ends the truce, blowing up the home of dealer Ferdy Dubal, killing him and his daughter. Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harper and Iles know the peace is over, as they try to solve the double homicide. Meanwhile Colin's teenage Jill explains the by-product outcome of the street deal in economic terms making Iles wonder if he has done the right thing. As the detectives investigate, more killings occur and the open drug war threatens the city making both cops reflect on the ethics of blinking.
The Harper-Iles police procedural has consistently been one of the best British police procedurals on the market for the past six or so years; the latest tale EASY STREETS perhaps is the best yet. Besides a fabulous investigation, readers see a fresh side to Iles whose conscience has taken a battering with the outcome of his drug policy yet he remains pompous and rigid as ever. Harper is his perfect sidekick but this single dad receives an education from his teenage daughters that open his eyes to the reality of the deal as much as the drug related murders do. Bill James is at his finest with this unsurpassed thriller that may prove to be the sub-genre's top novel of the year.
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