I love Soho. And finding out that the main plot of this book is set in one of my favourite places filled with fond memories of a previous place of employment, I had high hopes for this book. 

Unfortunately, I was sorely disappointed. 

I still love that the British Library Crime Classics are reminding us of some great novels we would otherwise miss out on, but this was not one of them. 

For all I care, I'd happily never encounter Brandon's work again. Ever. 

Still, I guess there is some value in having this book as a reminder that publishing and crime fiction in general have, for the most part, moved on from creating pulpy, badly researched, slashers that base their entire plot on the portrayal of racism and tropes

. 

I even gave this book the benefit of my doubt as far as I could because I fully understand why some of the xenophobia was present in this story, but this story just does not work. Near enough the entire story is set in the immigrant communities, and yet, the only plot and tension was created because of the cliched portrayal of the groups of immigrants. I cannot even think of any one individual character who was portrayed as an individual human being. Not a single one.

Add to this some other ridiculousness - apparently, there was an espionage story in there somewhere -  and I seriously cannot think why any trees had to die for this particular re-issue. 

Taking a last glance back at the figure upon which the disgruntled doctor was now engaged in stripping of its misleading apparel, something struck him concerning it which, until that moment, had not.

The shaven head without the wig intensified tremendously the Teutonic caste of the dead man’s face, even masked in make-up as it was. There, unquestionably, was your Prussian of the officer class. During his many visits to the Continent upon police business he had seen dozens who might have been blood brothers of the dead man. He had little doubt that, when the face was eventually cleaned off, the scars of student duelling affairs would be found bitten into it.

‘Espionage, right enough,’ he murmured. ‘But in what connection, and who was sufficiently antagonistic to what you were up to, to make a slaughterhouse end of you, such as they have done?’

The book had a strong start but the latest revelations and assumptions have been entirely ridiculous, even for the time of original publication. 

This story is headed towards Passenger to Frankfurt territory if it doesn't manage to turn a corner fairly soon.

Just how many times in his career McCarthy had boasted that he could traverse Soho at any hour of the day or night blindfolded, or in the thickest fog, was borne in weightily upon him at this moment. Fog was one thing, and bad enough in the congested streets of Soho to rattle anyone. But this never-to-be-sufficiently-damned black-out business was the absolute frozen limit! For the safety of the populace it was necessary, he supposed, and therefore had to be endured, but how the divil any man was supposed to get quickly upon the track of crime committed in it was something more than he was prepared to answer. His first crash was into a light standard which received the shock without murmur; his second was into someone who gave indignant tongue in a manner to which the word ‘murmur’ could certainly not be applied.

By the feel of the obstacle it was the front of an extremely stout Italian lady who cursed him fluently in what McCarthy instantly recognized as the Neapolitan idiom of his dead mother. It was interlarded with many calls upon the Madonna mia, and many other of the better known saints of her native land.

Haha.

by Christopher Golden

A collection of Christmas stories in the Horror genre was just too good of an idea to pass up! This one is a collection of 18 stories by a variety of authors. I had actually heard of three of them and read something by two of those, which gave me confidence of a certain level of writing.

To be honest, not all of the stories held up to expectation but enough of them did to make the collection worthwhile. Just two of them were written in present tense, which I find difficult to read, and two others were written in second person, which I don't see often.

There were some interesting ideas explored; zombie elves, creepy children, melting babies, obsessive or robot pets, a great twist on revenge, and an abusive husband returning from the dead among others.

The stand outs for me were Love Me by Thomas E. Sniegoski, Not Just For Christmas by Sarah Lotz, It's A Wonderful Life by Christopher Golden, The Second Floor of the Christmas Hotel by Joe R. Lansdale and Darrow Street by Elizabeth Hand.

Also very worthwhile were Fresh as the New-Fallen Snow by Seaman McGuire, Good Deeds by Jeff Strand (a very humorous entry), Mistletoe and Holly by James A. Moore, Home by Tim Lebbon and The Hangman's Bride by Sarah Pinborough.

The collection is definitely worthwhile for the Horror fan.

There was a time I was really into detective stories. Either on television or in books. I never seemed to tire from them. Until there was a moment where I felt I wanted to diversify the reading, and found I'm not really reading a lot of them at this point.

Silent Scream was one of the few I wanted to give a try though. And it was a bit of a mixed bag. On the plus side, I didn't foresee the ending and was actually quite surprised with it. For me, this might be the single most important factor in detective stories. It is nice to be able to figure things out before the detective, but sometimes you just want to get a run for your money (even if it is a review copy and you're not actually spending money on it). However, I didn't really like the main character, D.I. Kim Stone, she was a bit the textbook troubles detective who doesn't work by the book but apparently is so good at what she does that nobody seems to care. I hope she will improve her habits, as I plan to read some more books in the series.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!