On the Loose

Starred review from August 31, 2009
Fowler’s unique blend of the comic and the grotesque is on full display in his excellent seventh Peculiar Crimes Unit mystery (after 2008’s The Victoria Vanishes
). With the special police unit shut down, Arthur Bryant is feeling withdrawn and depressed while his partner, John May, is considering PI work. When a former team member stumbles on a beheaded corpse in the heart of London’s King’s Cross neighborhood, May artfully uses the discovery to gain the PCU another lease on life. He persuades the higherups that unsolved gang crimes in the area could threaten the economic benefit anticipated from the 2012 Olympics. Given one week to solve the case, without any official sanction or access to police resources, May pulls Bryant out of his doldrums and reassembles the unit. To May’s dismay, his colleague is more interested in reports that a man wearing a stag’s head has been seen in the area. The pacing, prose, planting of clues and characterizations are all top-notch.

November 1, 2009
Locked out and disbanded at the end of The Victoria Vanishes (2008), London's Peculiar Crimes Unit comes back from the grave to solve yet another bizarre case.

Urban planners have brought exciting new developments to the dicey neighborhood of King's Cross. One is a man wearing a stag's head who's frightening and perhaps abducting passersby. Another is the headless corpse in the freezer of a building that's the new home of the Paradise Chip Shop. The threat of negative publicity for the showcase project is so great that Oskar Kasavian and Leslie Faraday, sworn enemies of the PCU, agree to reconstitute it on an ad hoc basis—"no equipment, no money, no offices, no status, no technical backup, nothing"—if its members can solve the mystery before public confidence is undermined. Although equable John May is eager to go back to work, crusty Arthur Bryant, his fellow chief detective, is less interested in the murder than the stag-head man. Armed with his customary knowledge of all human endeavor, Bryant soon traces the apparent prankster's roots to the mythological Green Man, who"wants to reclaim the ancient woodlands" from the encroachments of railways and urban development. But the unit's investigation of the Albert Dock Architectural Partnership Trust (ADAPT) and its adversaries will lead them off on many tangents before the curtain comes crashing ambiguously down.

Neither the mystery nor the solution is up to Fowler's best work. But the reunion of the PCU is cause for such joy that only the most curmudgeonly fans will quibble.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

Starred review from September 1, 2009
London's Peculiar Crimes Unit, disbanded after solving the affair in "The Victoria Vanishes", is in disarray. Some team members have found jobs, others are looking for work, and Bryant is wasting away. Then a headless corpse is found in a freezer in a store in the King's Cross area. There is only one crime team capable of solving the bizarre murders that followthe Peculiar Crimes Unit swings into action. The trail twists and doubles back on itself, and the elderly Bryant and May bicker, but in the end they must acknowledge that they have met another bercriminal. VERDICT It's apparent that after seven Bryant and May titles, Fowler is working his way through the odd and peculiar bits of London history. No one does this better than Fowler, with the possible exception of Peter Ackroyd. [See Prepub Mystery, "LJ" 7/09.]

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2009
The efforts of various officials in the London police have finally succeeded in breaking up the Peculiar Crimes Unit (PCU). While most of the team have started remaking their lives, brilliant, eccentric Arthur Bryant has become a morose recluse. His old friend John May is definitely concerned. Then along comes a case that May thinks might pique Arthurs interest and put the unit back in business: a headless corpse is found stuffed in an old freezer. Strangely, its not the unfortunate dead guy that calls to the elderly Bryant. Hes more interested in the oddly dressed man causing havoc around a Kings Cross renovation project. With the groups future at stake, which case will win out? With a liberal dose of regional history and some surprising humor, this ensemble crime story has lots to offernot the least of which are a couple of great, unexpected twists that not only change the makeup of the PCU but also lead its members straight into adventures to come.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)