Kill Me (Harpur and Iles Series #17)

by Bill James

Overview

"[A] terrific series.... Get these books; settle into peril and chaos."—Bloomsbury Review

Naomi Anstruther's undercover operation among the drug gangs, planned carefully by Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur, has ended in a bloody shoot-out. Naomi escapes, but both her ex-boyfriend and her current lover—who shouldn't have been there—are dead. Now the biggest danger to Naomi is a young woman named Esme, who believes that she and Naomi should personally avenge Donald's and Lyndon's deaths.

"One of the most exquisitely sardonic stylists writing crime fiction today."—Richard Lopez, Washington Post Book World "[A] black and zestful police series.... Matchless stuff by the genre's finest stylist."—Literary Review "One of the most exquisitely sardonic stylists writing crime fiction today."—Richard Lopez, Washington Post Book World "A tremendous writer. . . . Where else can you find a mystery series with as many layers of gorgeous stuff?"—Chicago Tribune "Bill James's Harpur and Iles books are deliciously unsavory.—John Harvey, "The Crime Writer's Crime Writer," The Guardian "[A] brilliantly stylish series of novels .... A unique author who is an acquired habit, but once discovered, impossible to kick."—Daily Express [London], Frances Fyfield "British mystery writing's finest prose stylist...startling, achingly funny and sometimes wholly surreal.... Essential reading."—The Observer [London], Peter Guttridge

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393321661
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	06/17/2001
Series:	Harpur and Iles Series , #17
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	4.60(w) x 7.40(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Bill James has been called "the Elmore Leonard of Britain's underworld" (Kirkus Reviews) and has been named a "Master of Crime" in a mystery roundup by the London Sunday Times, which said, "There is nothing else quite like this series of police procedurals. James is concerned with the dilemmas and difficulties of policing Britain's inner cities, and he addresses these in hard-edged narratives that leave readers gasping and flinching, praying the people in these stories never come to live in their streets." In addition to the Harpur and Iles series, James is the author of other mystery series and a book on Anthony Powell. He lives in Wales.

Editorial Reviews

British mystery writing's finest prose stylist...startling, achingly funny and sometimes wholly surreal.... Essential reading. —Observer

Peter Guttridge

[A] black and zestful police series.... Matchless stuff by the genre's finest stylist.

Literary Review

One of the most exquisitely sardonic stylists writing crime fiction today. —Washington Post Book World

Richard Lopez

[A] terrific series.... Get these books; settle into peril and chaos.

Bloomsbury Review

A tremendous writer. . . . Where else can you find a mystery series with as many layers of gorgeous stuff?

Chicago Tribune

Bill James's Harpur and Iles books are deliciously unsavory. —Guardian

John Harvey

[A] brilliantly stylish series of novels .... A unique author who is an acquired habit, but once discovered, impossible to kick. —Daily Express

Frances Fyfield

The last six books in James's Harpur & Iles series about a nameless city near London have been like one of those gigantic party sandwiches--they're stuffed with prime ingredients but it's hard to tell where one slice ends and another begins. James still offers a lot of nourishment here, especially for longtime fans, but it's beginning to feel as though we're nearing the end of the loaf. Undercover cop Naomi Anstruther survives a shoot-out at a posh London restaurant when a drug operation goes awry, but ex-boyfriend Donald McWater and new flame Lyndon Evans die. As drug dealers fall in and out and police officers appear to bend or break under pressure, Naomi teams up with a young woman friend, Esm , in a personal quest to avenge the deaths of Donald and Lyndon. Unfortunately, characters who in the past have made us hoot with laughter now mostly grate and beg to be skipped over: the antics of Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur have become less appealing; the lunatic unpredictability of his sleek boss, Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles, has become, well, predictable. James is too gifted a writer to give up without a fight, and he does provide some lovely moments of Ilesian rancor. Also, a nasty piece of work, a police psychiatrist named Rockmain--introduced in Eton Crop--resurfaces with a hilariously kinky request that explains the title. But new readers eager to find out why the Harpur & Iles books have received so much praise would do better to start at the beginning, with You'd Better Believe It, and work their way through to Roses, Roses. (May) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

If Eton Crop (1999) was the slack-paced setup, this is the payoff come to a rolling boil and served up with James's strident sense of drama. Still in place at the fashionable Eton, undercover P.C. Naomi Anstruther barely escapes with her life when a Harpur-and-Iles-planned drug intercept fails, the bad guys get away, and two of her former lovers on the scene are killed. Esme, also an ex-lover of one of the fallen, nudges Naomi to seek vengeance, but before Naomi is onboard, Esme's been tortured and killed. Meanwhile, warring drug factions queue up to bump each other off, make Naomi's quietus, and, if possible, come to some sort of accommodation with Chief Supt. Harpur that will allow the winning goons to stay in business. Will Lincoln W. Lincoln (a.k.a. Lovely Mover) outlast Panicking Ralph Ember? Will Noisy Graham's restaurant supplant the now déclassé Eton? Will Harpur's acidic boss Iles ever stop tweaking Harpur for having slept with his wife? Before Naomi can return to duty, she must be vetted by loony police psychiatrist Rockmain, whose scheme to get her reinstated is as cuckoo as the dithering machinations of Chief Constable Mark Lane. As alliances are reshaped with each thud of a corpse, the uninitiate will need a flow chart to sort through the debris dirtying up the Cardiff countryside, now polluted with lowlifes imported from London, Manchester, and Wales. James, who excels at verbal-slanging matches and tetchy characters, pumps up the venom here. To be read with your back firmly resting against the wall.

Kirkus Reviews