"Stuffed full of dark humour and quick wit, this pacy crime novel set in Glasgow boasts gangsters galore, a drawer full of radioactive shoes, llamas, an emu, and the most gloriously vexatious protagonist."
In Loose Threads we meet a whole host of criminals from the bottom to the very top of the criminal underworld as the police call in Robbie Gould, to assist in a missing person case while they investigate a case of another kind, one containing a very dead body. If you get a kick out of the quick and deadly dark humour of M.W Craven, Mark Billingham, and Chris Brookmyre then come try out Martin Stewart. I experienced the same reading joy of being on the edge, of not knowing what the main character or plot was going to do next, and loving every single entertaining second. Loose Threads is next in the series after the author’s adult debut Double Proof, which I haven’t yet read and am now going to hunt down. I stepped into the second book with ease, it includes enough background that I didn’t feel I was missing critical information which is always a good sign. That doesn’t mean to say you can relax, oh no, from the get-go you need to be wide awake and ready for action. I adore the main character Gould, this former rain bonnet and flipflop wearing reporter and boxer with an eye for the story and a reputation of being psychic, is also more than capable of causing extreme irritation and he knows it. The other characters slot nicely into place, there are a fair few yet each joins the caper with precision while Glasgow enjoys being the main setting for this thrills and spills ride. The plot felt like I’d been fired into a pinball machine, I loved the uncertainty, the rapid changes of direction, the hard knocks and jabs which is why this has been chosen as a LoveReading Star Book. A cracking crime novel, Loose Threads ramps up the energy and tension while delivering whiplash wit and humour, it’s highly recommended by the LoveReading team.
| Primary Genre | Crime and Mystery |
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Three homicidal maniacs. Two radioactive shoes. One body in a suitcase.
When Dr David Cairney, a politics lecturer, goes missing on the way home from his retirement party, his wife asks ex-boxer and journalist Robbie Gould for help. Gould wants nothing to do with it. But he needs the money.
Meanwhile, the body of another politics lecturer, Professor Stephen Hogg, has been found, his body folded into a suitcase beside the Clydeside Expressway. While poking around the murder victim’s office, Gould encounters pathologist Sarah Badar. She worked on Hogg’s post mortem, only to find her report redacted, and she wants answers too.
As the pair delve deeper into the case, they unearth connections between the two academics and a rogues’ gallery of oddballs and grotesques including rival gangsters from Edinburgh and Glasgow, a llama-farm owner in Kirkintilloch and an ex-KGB general with a trepanned skull and a thirst for vengeance.
Sarah and Gould find themselves immersed in a world of missing Kremlin diamonds and pre-digital espionage – all coded signals, orange peel and scraps of red thread.
Loose Threads features in the following genres: Books of the Month, Star Books, Crime and Mystery, Espionage and spy thriller, Humorous Fiction, Thriller and Suspense, Crime and Mystery, Crime and mystery: hard-boiled crime, noir fiction, Crime and mystery: private investigator / amateur detectives, Humorous Fiction, Narrative theme: Sense of place, Espionage and spy thriller
Loose Threads is available in Paperback
Loose Threads was written by Martin Stewart and published by Polygon
Loose Threads has 272 pages
£8.99
