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Published Mar 2012
352 pages
Genre: Mysteries
Publication Information
Christopher Fowler's acclaimed Peculiar Crimes Unit novels crackle with sly wit, lively suspense, and twists as chilling as London's fog. Now the indomitable duo of Arthur Bryant and John May, along with the rest of their quirky team, return to solve a confounding case with dark ties to the British theater and a killer who may mean curtains for all involved.
For the crew of the New Strand Theatre, the play The Two Murderers seems less performance than prophecy when a cast party ends in the shocking death of the theater owner's son. The crime scene is most unusual, even for Bryant and May. In a locked bedroom without any trace of fingerprints or blood, the only sign of disturbance is a gruesome life-size puppet of Mr. Punch laying on the floor. Everyone at the party is a suspect, including the corrupt producer, the rakish male lead, the dour set designer, and the assistant stage manager, who is the wild daughter of a prominent government official.
It's this last fact that threatens the Peculiar Crimes Unit's investigation, as the government's Home Office, wary of the team's eccentric methods, seeks to throw them off the case. But the nimble minds of Bryant and May are not so easily deterred. Delving into the history of the London theater and the disturbing origins of Punch and Judy, the detectives race to find the maniacal killer before he reaches his even deadlier final act.
Whip-smart and endlessly entertaining, The Memory of Blood is an ingeniously intricate mystery from the deliciously inventive Christopher Fowler.
"Starred Review. Bryant's eccentric pedantry, May's hard-boiled attitude - amid his trademark mix of whimsical humor and macabre thrills." - Publishers Weekly
"Though no single element stands out, Fowler achieves a fine balance between the impossible crime, the juggling of suspects and motives, Mr. Bryant's flights of recondite erudition, the planting and decoding of clues and the obligatory plots to discredit and disband the PCU." - Kirkus Reviews
"Fowler's growing body of fans will snatch this one up, and readers who enjoy Golden Age-style mysteries with a spot of humor and gothic atmosphere shouldn't miss this." - Library Journal
This information about The Memory of Blood was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
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Photo: Martin Butterworth
Christopher Fowler was the award-winning author of over thirty novels and twelve short story collections, including the Bryant & May mystery novels, for which he was best known. The novels featured veteran detectives solving unusual crimes in London from the second world war to the present day.
Fowler died in March 2023 of cancer, aged 69. More
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