Peter James - Dead Mans Grip

review by Brian Lowen on show 19th January.
The latest in a series of detective thrillers starring Detective Superintendent Roy Grace of the Brighton Police Force.

Once again all the action takes place in Brighton and Worthing and is accurate to the areas described. This book is as good as all the others in this series, all featuring the word ‘dead’ in the title. Peter James has managed to keep up a series of thrillers that continue to grip you from start to finish and he continues to be my favourite writer of detective thrillers.

The story features a young single mum, Carly Chase with a young son, who is involved in a serious traffic accident, which is not her fault, but as she was over the alcohol limit, she loses her licence.

An American student at Brighton College is late for class and hurtles down a hill on his bicycle. He takes the corner at a junction, and forgetting he is in England, rides round the corner on the wrong side of the road. Carly swerves her car to avoid him but he his hit by a white van and thrown under the wheels of an articulated lorry.

When his parents, who are senior figures in the American Mafia, are informed of his death they seek revenge by employing a hit man to take out the three people involved in the accident that killed their son.

The drivers of the other two vehicles are killed in a most sadistic and gruesome way and Roy Grace now realises that Carly is next on the list.

Peter James goes into great detail as the investigation continues, reaching it’s dramatic climax in Shoreham harbour. The detail only heightens the tension as the chase continues and you become thoroughly involved in the story. A real page turner this one.

Roy Grace also has to deal with the worry associated with his girl friend’s difficult pregnancy and has problems keeping focused on the case.

We also get another little snippet concerning his previous wife who disappeared without trace over ten years ago. She is apparently living in Germany and she is stunned to read a notice in her local paper seeking her whereabouts. Roy wants to have her listed as presumed dead so that he can marry Cleo, his new girl friend, and in each book in the series we get to know a little bit more about this mystery. I wonder what will happen in the next book, to which I am eagerly looking forward.