Autographs in the Rain (Bob Skinner Mysteries) by Quintin Jardine
| Autographs in the Rain (Bob Skinner Mysteries) by Quintin Jardine | |
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| Category: Crime | |
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Reviewer: Sue Magee
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| Summary: The eleventh book in the Bob Skinner series sees Skinner worried that a new colleague is enlarging his territory at Skinner's expense - then he realises that a shot which he thought was fired at him was actually directed at an old flame who's now a film star. A good read. | |
| Buy? Yes | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 416/10h2m | Date: July 2001 |
| Publisher: Headline | |
| External links: Author's website | |
| ISBN: 978-0747274469 | |
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There's a new Assistant Chief Constable in post and he's not so much worrying Deputy Chief Constable Bob Skinner as annoying him and that's something Theodore Chase (known as Ted) should be careful about. Chase believes that he'd make a better deputy chief constable than Skinner and he's not worried who knows about it. Chief Constable Sir James Proud is keeping above the fray, but it's fairly obvious where his sympathies lie. Chase gets a boost to his campaign when the Metropolitan Police accuse Skinner of wasting police time: a shot was fired when Skinner was in London having dinner with Louise Bankier, an old flame, who's now a film star - only there's no evidence to support what he says. Chase is suggesting that Skinner has mental problems.
When Louise Bankier comes on location to Edinburgh it becomes obvious that the shot which was fired was aimed at Bankier and not Skinner: Bankier has a stalker and there's no shortage of suspects, both personal and professional. If you're trying to work out 'whodunnit' there's a problem with this series: all the characters come off the page fully formed and it's just about possible to make an excellent case against everyone you meet. I didn't get it right though - and the reveal was a decent surprise. I wasn't totally convinced, but it didn't leave me groaning.
All the books have the same standard of characterisation and there's also a great sense of location, particularly in and around Edinburgh: I regularly walk the streets with the characters.
I've been having problems with my vision, so rather than read the series I've been listening to audio downloads (which I've bought myself) narrated by James Bryce, who seems to have taken on the mammoth task of narrating all the Skinner books (that's twenty six as at July 2016) and turning a cast consisting mainly of middle-aged male Scots who would probably all sound pretty much the same in real life into individual personalities.
All the books in the series could be read as standalones (they're mercifully free of spoilers), but you will get more out of them if you read them in chronological order as the Skinner family saga does play a major part in the stories. It's not normally something which appeals to me, but I'll confess to being hooked on the Skinner soap opera.
Quintin Jardine's Bob Skinner Novels in Chronological Order
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