Shedunnit and other podcasts

 My long time preferred bedtime listening has been Melvyn Bragg’s In Our Time. It’s intelligent, discursive and not aggressive or shrieky. 

The recent news that he has left the programme has made me search a little wider.

I’ve discovered other podcasts.

Not Just the Tudors, presented by Suzannah Lipscomb, covers aspects of that period of history, usually as a discussi0n with one guest.

Betwixt the Sheets, presented by sex historian Kate Lister, looks at sexual behaviour and stories ‘that’d make you history teacher blush’.

But at the moment I’m enjoying Shedunnit, presented by Caroline Crampton, which discusses detective fiction and writers, mainly from the Golden Age of the whodunnit, between the first and second World Wars.

As a result I’ve read a couple of titles from ECR Lorac, both set in WW2 - and thoroughly enjoyed them - Bats in the Belfry and Murder by Matchlight. 

 For a change I’ll probably read some of Dorothy L Sayers. I read some long ago, but really can’t say I remember either the titles or the stories now.

Back to the crime novels . . .

First of all a couple of books by Graeme Macrae Burnet.  Both The Disappearance of Adele Bedeau  and The Accident on the A35 are set in the small town of Saint-Louis in Alsace and they feature local police chief Georges Gorski - almost an anti-Maigret figure.
The atmosphere and vivid depiction of local places and people is reminiscent of Simenon's work. Not at all feminist - most of the women are objectified or background figures.
Both books are presented as translations from the French, adding an extra layer of playful mystification to the stories. There are mysteries and crimes to solve, but not always in the way the reader is led to expect.
I thoroughly enjoyed both, and will probably re-read them.

Then as a contrast I decided it was time to tackle something by Val McDermid, and as Splinter the Silence was on offer on Amazon, this was the one.
This is definitely feminist, not only in the fact that the chief police character is a woman, as is the genius cyber investigator, but also the nature of the crime. The victims are chosen because they are vocal about women's rights and won't be shut up. The perpetrator has an almost religious zeal to return women to their proper place - at home with the children.  The deaths are copycat versions of the suicides of famous female authors.  It's right up to date with internet trolls and cyber investigations too. I shall read more.

Faceless Killers - Henning Mankell

I think this is the first of the Wallander series -

A binge on thrillers

Erin Hart - Haunted Ground
Peter Robinson - The Summer that Never Was (an Alan Banks story)
Kathy Reichs - Cross Bones

Reading for a week in a holiday cottage - much enjoyed.  And, may be a coincidence, but each of these books worked on a double time-scale.

Stephen Leather

I downloaded his 'The Basement' but really hated it - in fact I have read only the first couple of chapters. Sadistic misogynistic main character.

Larsson, Nesbo, Indridason

I'm having a binge on Scandinavian crime books - had to hurry through some of the gory violent bits in the 'Girl' trilogy, and in Nesbo's Snowman but have found all of them so far as absorbing as previous crimi-binges (Cornwell, Nicci French, Kathy Reichs etc).

I have downloaded some classics on my Kindle - but these crimis are first choice just now.

Stuart MacBride - Dying Light

I wondered why I felt so miserable and negative this morning - could be from an overdose of the grit and realism, serial-killers, arsonists, and drug-dealing thugs in this book , along with a reader of crime-thrillers, who isn't quite clever enough to frame her hated neighbour for her cheating husband's murder.

Yes, well-written, yes atmospheric, but somehow I started to feel complicit and a voyeur, and that ain't nice.

Stephen Booth - Blood on the Tongue

I'm a sucker for books set in the Peak District, and for crime novels, so this has to be a winner.

Edendale is apparently based in Hathersage, as seen from Surprise View, but the place has something of the atmosphere of Matlock , to my mind.

The events in this book take place around the Snake Pass and Bleaklow area. Irontongue Hill, (an invented name) is the site of a World War 2 air crash. Investigations of suspicious deaths in the area sixty years later involve the descendants of two of the crew, the only survivor from the crash, and a man who had witnessed the scene as an eight-year-old. There is interesting information on the Polish community, too.
Booth's main police characters Ben Cooper and Diane Fry and the tensions between them hold the story together tightly.

Broken Skin by Stuart MacBride

A little light relief from the more serious reading?


Gruesome crime writing, involving two main plotlines - one a local celeb footballer who rapes and disfigures women, and the other involving sadomasochism. All set in Aberdeen, with strongly drawn police characters. Logan McRae, his girlfriend Jackie Watson and their superiors Insch, a fat guy constantly eating and trying to lose half his body weight, while directing G & S in his spare time, and Steel a lesbian tough gal. Not to forget 'Spanky' Rickards, who provides a useful insight and intro into the bondage scene. Dark humour too.


I read this one in a couple of days.