4.0 out of 5 stars
Good British procedural..., Mar 14 2012
This review is from: Luther: The Calling: A Novel (Paperback)
I wasn't familiar with the BBC series, "Luther", when friend told me about Neil Cross's novel, "Luther: The Calling". I ordered it from Amazon/UK because it won't be published here in the US for another few months. I was expecting an excellent story and received a very good one. Neil Cross's story of DCI John Luther of the London Police force seems to have been written as a prelude to the BBC series stories, and introduces the main characters.
Cross introduces John Luther, a tormented black policeman whose problems have problems! He's separating from his wife, who he's closed off from emotionally. A sick killer is at large in London, slashing his way through "perfect families", and Luther is in charge of tracking him down. And another story about an old man who's being pressured into selling his house to a developer. There's plenty of violence, done by both good and bad guys. The violence is graphic but not particularly gratuitous.
The problem with the book is that it just isn't as good as other British procedurals, by Ian Rankin and Ian Banks, among others. The book simply has too many preposterous plot points. I mean, a reader often has to suspend belief when reading fiction, but in "Luther", the reader is suspended in a pit the depth of the Grand Canyon! But I think that's because the book was written as an adjunct to a TV series. The violence and the action has to be on-going. There's not much subtlety in Cross's writing. However, the book IS enjoyable. I'll check out Cross's other books and the BBC series.
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