"Two of [John Coffin's] policemen have died in apparent accidents. Coffin, suspicious, dispatches Phoebe Astley, a onetime paramour, to a clothing boutique suspected of laundering money, as part of an undercover operation. Then a charred body found near a strange tree seems to have belonged to the wife of one of Coffin's dead cops. But little is what it seems to be. Phoebe disappears and an unattached head (one item in a large body and body-part count) is sighted floating in the Thames. The frightened woman in charge of the store and the secretive pensioner who labors on artistic artifacts beneath the eerie tree are just two of the many odd souls who inhabit this brooding tale. Butler has fun teasing us with the identities of the dead, and Coffin's actress wife Stella Pinero, who manages to be both likable and thoroughly theatrical at the same time, adds some levity to these dark proceedings."
I liked this book. I really like the relationship between Coffin and his wife Stella. I also liked the explanation of the setting of these books that the author gives us at the beginning of the book. Here's what she said, "One evening in April, 1988, I sat in the Toynbee Hall in the East End of London, near to Docklands, listening to Dr. David Owen (now Lord Owen) give that year's Barnett Memorial Lecture. In it, he suggested the creation of a Second City of London, to be spun off from the first, to aid the economic and social regeneration of the Docklands. The idea fascinated me and I made use of it to create a new world for my detective, John Coffin, to whom I gave the task of keeping the Queen's Peace there." It was so nice to get an explanation about the Second City that we keep hearing about in these books!
Yup. I like the series. Interesting, engaging, entertaining...they're good.
Bad language: don't think so
Sex: nope
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