Snake Pass

February 1, 2015
A righteous Yorkshire cop can't seem to stay out of trouble. In order to rescue brutally assaulted teen Sharon Davis, veteran lawman Jim Grant breaks into the house where her assailant, Lee Adkins, is hiding and beats him for good measure. When Jamie Hope, the young constable who assisted him, reports Grant's excesses, the gritty Yorkshire cop gets suspended. It's a cold and snowy night, to boot. Needing a sympathetic ear and hoping for more, Grant heads to the Woodside Truck Stop and Diner and waitress Wendy Rivers, with whom he's had a long-running flirtation. Sure enough, warm, sassy Wendy puts him back in a good mood. But as he's about to drive away, Grant notices the lights go out in the diner, even though the place never closes. In the shadows, he discerns that a robbery is in progress and sneaks back in, thinking, first, that he can save Wendy and, second, that this might be exciting. The ensuing action unfolds in short, punchy chapters whose titles give minute-by-minute times. Grant watches the Ukrainian head thug pummel Wendy in an unsuccessful attempt to learn the location of the safe. When the tough goes looking for the chef, high-maintenance Mickey Frevert, Grant calls headquarters for backup, then rescues Wendy, at least temporarily. Next, the last person Grant could possibly want as an ally shows up: Jamie Hope. The arrival of more Ukrainians leaves the good guys feeling seriously overmatched. Campbell's fourth Resurrection Man novel (Adobe Flats, 2014, etc.) is crackerjack entertainment: taut, gritty and full of devilish twists.

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March 1, 2015

Before tough-talking copper Jim Grant left his native England for a forced sabbatical of sorts in the States (Jamaica Plains: Montecito Heights; Adobe Flats), he had one of the highest clearance rates on the force in Yorkshire. Sure, his methods weren't always by the book, but he got the job done, and he didn't so much break the rules as bend them. During a bust on a council estate, Grant takes down a major player but the brass questions exactly how he managed to find such a large stash of drugs and cash on what should have been a routine ID search. Of course, a suspension has never stopped Grant from enforcing the law, so he doesn't think twice about intervening in a robbery in progress at a local bar. This is more than a simple stickup, and Grant is soon faced with a skilled crew of eastern European hit men with more on their agenda than just grabbing a few pounds from the cash register. VERDICT Campbell's gritty noir style and hard-hitting action scenes mix well with Grant's dry wit, making this fourth series installment (and a prequel of sorts) a rollicking good time.

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