Ian Brotherhood

The story is set in a near future Britain in the direst quarter of an unnamed city.  This is a landscape of tower blocks of huge street lamps that turn the world a shade of greyish orange – beneath which all human activity seems suspect – of winding paths and foot bridges over never quiet motorways.

A government initiative to deal with increasing opposition to unpopular council tax rises contracts bands of citizen volunteers to collect payment.  Francine O’Brallahan aka Bulletproof Suzy, a highly intelligent though somewhat violent member of the urban underclass, recruits three other young females, her ‘little ladies’, to exploit the opportunity to earn enough cash to find a better life.

Suzy’s middle class politically correct friend Joanne disapproves of the venture and their friendship is broken. Joanne is found brutally murdered outside Suzy’s tower block not long afterwards.  Suzy and her crew set about finding the killer to exact retribution in the only way that they know, but there are two deadly and ominous complications: as far as the city police are concerned, Suzy herself remains the prime suspect and there appears to be damning video evidence to back up their theory; there is a menacing new gang infiltrating Suzy’s neighbourhood – they’re numerous, sophisticated and armed to the teeth and they’re after Suzy’s blood.

Ian Brotherhood’s debut novel seems destined to become a modern cult classic.  Suzy’s narrative is pacy,  fresh and idiosyncratic and her character is an astonishing creation-perhaps the first significant female anti-hero of the 21st century.

This is a short sharp left hook of a book, and it hits the spot.

Reviews

‘Bulletproof Suzy is certainly not the kind of girl you’d take home to meet the parentals. It is a heady mix, to be sure, and one that easily pulls you right through this, Brotherhood’s debut novel. It’s a fast read and as entertaining as it is brutal.’ 
The Big Issue

‘This is an ambitious, powerful novel from an important new voice.’ 
Jules Horne

‘Brotherhood… demonstrates a unique view and flair for action.’ 
Michael Stotter, Shotsmag

Craig Smith

Kufstein, Austria, 1939

At the foot of a mountain known as The Wilder Kaiser lies the body of an SS officer, his neck broken but his face a picture of bliss and serenity. The dead man is known to history as Otto Rahn, Himmler’s own archaeologist. Rahn’s pursuit of the legendary Blood Lance of the Cathars has not only led to his own downfall but set in motion a tragic chain of events reaching far beyond the holocaust.

Switzerland 1997

Lord Robert Kenyon is a wealthy financier and a senior member of a humanitarian order calling themselves The Knights of the Holy Lance. Whilst climbing the North face of the Eiger with his new bride, he is attacked and murdered and his young wife Kate left for dead.

New York City 2008

When billionaire Jack Farrell, long suspected of connections to European crime syndicates cuts loose after defrauding his own company, ex CIA agent Thomas Malloy is assigned to track him down. The trail leads to Germany and the Order of the Holy Lance. With his friends, former art thieves Kate and Ethan Brand, Malloy set out to unlock the secrets of the order: Malloy seeks his man; Kate must find the truth about what happened on the slopes of the Eiger eleven years before – and exact her vengeance. Their first step is to kidnap a corrupt lawyer, connected to the order, from his home in Hamburg. Things don’t quite run to plan – and all hell breaks loose.

Reviews

‘A marvellously thrilling book. . . the distinction between villain and hero is constantly blurred. . . a most enthralling story.’   Paul Doherty, author of the Hugh Corbett mysteries 

‘Seamlessly mixing history, legend and fiction Smith’s writing is both intelligent and exhilarating. His characters are alive, and the twists and turns of the several plots will keep readers breathless.’  Historical Novels Review

Craig Smith

Cold Rain was one of only five novels shortlisted for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Best Thriller 2011

The author of The Blood Lance and The Painted Messiah demonstrates his versatility with this dark, stylish noir thriller set on and around a Midwestern university campus.

‘I turned thirty-seven that summer, older than Dante when he toured Hell, but only by a couple of years.’

Life couldn’t be better for David Albo, an associate professor of English at a small midwestern university. He lives in an idyllic, out-of-town, plantation-style mansion with a beautiful and intelligent wife and an adoring teenage stepdaughter. As he returns to the university after a long and relaxing sabbatical, there is a full professorship in the offingand, what’s more, he has managed to stay off the booze for two whole years. But, once term begins, things deteriorate rapidly. The damning evidence that he has sexually harassed his students is just the beginning as Dave finds himself sucked into a vortex of conspiracy, betrayal, jealousy, and murder. Unless he can discover quickly who is out to destroy him, all that he is and loves is about to be stripped away.

Reviews

‘A fine novel, suspenseful and impossible to stop reading.’  David Pitt, Booklist

‘You know that dull weekend when the weather doesn’t tempt you to go out and there’s nothing on television? Right – well this is the book you need.’ Sue Macgee, The Bookbag

Craig Smith

An intelligent and superior example of a genre whose popularity shows no signs of abating. It combines a blistering action thriller set in the streets of Zurich and on the lakes and wooded slopes of Switzerland with a compulsive and convincing account of first century Romano-Judaean politics and the real reason for Pontius Pilate’s condemnation and execution of Christ

A legend persists that, after the ‘scourging’, Pilate commanded that his victim be painted from life. Somewhere, the painting survives, the only true image of Christ, granting the gift of everlasting life to whoever possesses it.

Kate Kenyon, the wealthy young widow of an English aristocrat killed on a Swiss mountain, has an addiction to mortal risk. She feeds it by engaging in the armed robbery of priceless artefacts with her accomplice and lover Ethan Brand, a Tennessean who owns a bookshop in Zurich. Their latest target is a priceless ‘Byzantine’ icon hidden in the tower of a chateau by Lake Lucerne. So far they have never had to shoot anyone. This time will be different.

Thomas Malloy is a retired CIA man looking for his first lucrative freelance assignment. His chance comes with a presidential favour to a rich but ailing televangelist. Malloy’s task seems simple enough: pick up the preacher’s newly acquired painting from a Zurich bank and get it to the airport. But, once in Switzerland, Malloy’s old friend, the enigmatic Contessa Claudia de Medici tries to warn him off his mission.

Sir Julian Corbeau is an international criminal holed up in Switzerland to avoid US extradition proceedings. He is also the sadistic head of the modern Knights Templar. He had the painting and now he desperately wants it back as well as to wreak a bloody revenge upon those who stole it.

As the contenders vie for possession the bullets fly, the body count rises and the secrets of the portrait gradually unfold. We learn how and why it came to be painted and how an object depicting the Light of the World could exert such a baleful and malignant influence on those who possess it.

Reviews

‘I got paper friction burns on my fingers and pressure sores elsewhere because I could barely move until I’d finished it. Things were so tense that at several points I had to remind myself to breathe . . This is definitely the book for that long haul flight or the arduous train journey, you’ll be there in a flash, but be sure to pack the portable defibrillator just in case.’ 
Dovegreyreader’s literary blog

‘A marvellously thrilling book . . . the distinction between villain and hero is constantly blurred. . . a most enthralling story.’
Paul Doherty, author of the Hugh Corbett mysteries

‘A rattling good yarn.  Fast paced, exciting and very very filmic.’  
Random Jottings of a Book and Opera Lover literary blog

C. David Ingram

‘I guess the end justifies the means. At least that’s what I believe. Most of the time.’

After the accident, DC Cameron Stone had spent three months in intensive care before he could even recall what happened: the high speed pursuit of a vice baron through the night streets of Glasgow that had not only almost finished him but had taken the life of a teenage mother and her child. Then there’d been the message from Audrey on the back of a ‘get well soon’ card announcing that she had left him and taken their young son, Mark, with her. Booze, anti-depressants and therapy have all failed to enable him to resume his old job.

So now Stone lives in a one-room flat in the worst part of town. He pays the rent by running errands for a private detective agency. His tasks include tracking down a teenage runaway and surveillance for a woman who thinks her husband is sleeping with her sister. He’s also paid by his former colleagues, doing the work that’s not quite clean enough for them to do themselves- like putting the fear of God into Jason Campbell, a newly released sex offender whose been seen hanging around the local High School in his soft-top Mercedes.

Stone is having a bad week. Audrey is getting difficult about contact arrangements for Mark. She’s moved into the plush home of a plastic surgeon: there’s talk of marriage- and adoption for Mark. He finds his runaway in a brothel and just gets roughed-up for his trouble. There’s the knife wielding kids who try to mug him on the stairs and the daubing on his front door: Burn in Hell Baby Killer. The only brightness on his horizon is his growing friendship with Liz, the sunny Irish nurse who lives on the next floor. But then petrol is poured through his letterbox and his flat ablaze. And now a stranger has turned up at the school and driven off with his son…

Reviews

‘There were some stunning debuts this year, but if I had to pick one it would be this world class Scottish thriller… with a cracking storyline and dialogue so authentic you can here the neds speak, this Paisley author scores a massive hit with a debut that promises to be the start of something big.’ Shari Low, The Daily Record

‘This great first book makes me want to read the next instalment – Ingram having promised some interesting times ahead for Cameron Stone.’  Paul Blackburn, Eurocrime