High marks for that ingenious title, which effortlessly evokes the hazy shades of the sultry Floridian Keys the place this homicide (possibly?) thriller takes place. On the similar time, that intelligent phrase rings huge bells with readers of my period who lower our crime fiction fangs on pulp-fiction detective tales just like the John D MacDonald novels from the Nineteen Sixties and 70s.
The Travis McGee mysteries had been equally set in Florida, the place the drop-out protagonist champions misplaced causes and hopeless circumstances, and the primary was titled The Deep Blue Good-by. This certainly can’t be coincidental…
Liquid Shades positively delivers lots of the staples of old-school American noir, together with a gap scene which might’ve come straight out of a James Ellroy novel. Our hungover investigator wakes bemused within the mattress of a gorgeous femme fatale, unable to recall fairly what occurred within the steamy small hours. Then he will get a message with the worst potential information – a dying within the household – which exhumes skeletons from closets and opens previous wounds, and drags him on a merry dance on both facet of the authorized line till his quest for the reality results in a deeply private confrontation. Authorized scheming to organised crime to sibling rivalry: it’s all right here.
Regardless of the dysfunctional household dynamic, the fashionable writing is participating and entertaining. I rattled by way of the story in a few sittings and though it offers with some severely grim points – the consequences of a suicide on the surviving household, as an example – it doesn’t get slowed down in distress. That’s the place Liquid Shades positively differs from the tougher edged traditional noir which might get depressingly nihilistic at occasions.
As an alternative, there’s a robust optimistic thread woven into this narrative, an affirmation of loyalty, friendship and honesty. So whereas – in fact – the unhealthy guys are merciless brutes and the plot hinges on appalling acts of betrayal, the story is resolved with a satisfying sense of redemption, of wrongs being put proper.
Totally satisfying. Stay up for the subsequent one.
8/10
Reviewed by Rowena Hoseason
Liquid Shades of Blue by James Polkinghorn is offered at Amazon
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