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Geoffrey Wansell

Thrillers and Crime Reviews

Thrillers Crime

4th February 2021

THE SANITORIUM by Sarah Pearse
(Bantam £12.99, 400 pp)

The Sanitorium This menacing, creepy debut focuses on a young female detective from Devon who attends her younger brother’s engagement party in an abandoned sanatorium now transformed into an ultra-chic hotel high in the Swiss Alps.
It’s the last place DS Elin Warner wants to be, as she and her brother have not been close since a family tragedy years ago, but she feels obliged.
No sooner has she arrived, however, than a vast storm surrounds the isolated hotel. The following morning, her brother’s fiancée disappears without a trace. The longer she stays missing the more the other storm-trapped guests start to panic. Then a body is discovered and another woman vanishes.
Slowly the dark secrets hidden in the sinister building emerge from the shadows. There are echoes of Hitchcock and du Maurier, but Pearse has her own distinctive, emotional voice — one to be admired.

4th February 2021

FIND YOU FIRST by Linwood Barclay
(HQ £20, 400 pp)

Find You First A fast-moving, high concept thriller from the talented Barclay sees tech multi-millionaire Miles Cookson, a fit man of 42, diagnosed with Huntington’s chorea, a terminal brain disease that will render him unable to think clearly before it kills him.
Cookson has never married so there are no children to leave his wealth to. But 20 years ago he donated sperm at a fertility clinic, so he decides to track down any children born to split his inheritance between them.
Meanwhile, mysterious financier Jeremy Pritkin, who has impressive political and social connections but less savoury appetites, especially for young girls, embarks on a mission to erase all trace of Miles’s children. So begins a race against time with Cookson determined to do the right thing, and Pritkin the wrong. It is a rip-roaring rollercoaster of a ride.

4th February 2021

SLOUGH HOUSE by Mick Herron
(John Murray £14.99, 320 pp)

Slough House The slow horses of the secret service — men and women whose spying careers are ranked as failures, led by the grumpy Jackson Lamb — seem to be under threat.
The mainstream service is determined to erase them from history and, more worryingly, some fall victim to fatal accidents. Meanwhile, the mainstream are focusing on a response to the novichok poisoning of a British citizen on home soil in the wake of a spineless response from Her Majesty’s Government.
In the seventh story in this series, Herron beautifully describes the lives of the spies with a past but no future who are left to confront those who believe they have a future but can ignore the past — while all the time Jackson Lamb broods over the coils of the story like the spymaster he truly is.

It’s no surprise the books are soon to become a television series starring Gary Oldman as Lamb.

7th January 2021

THE NIGHT AGENT by Mathew Quirk
(Head of Zeus £18.99, 432 pp)

The Night Agent Ambitious FBI agent Peter Sutherland finds himself on endless night shifts in the Situation Room at the White House monitoring a secret emergency phone line that never rings.
Until late one night it does, and a terrified young woman tells him that her aunt and uncle have been murdered and their killer might still be in the house. But there is more to it even than that.
She goes on to explain that her aunt gave her this phone number, as well as a code to ensure that she be believed, to warn of an impending attack on American soil.
Sutherland rushes to help the woman, and finds himself being hunted by a vicious Russian assassin who seems to be working with the assistance of someone in the highest reaches of government.
Events turn ugly and the agent and the young woman he has gone to help rapidly find themselves on the run.
This is David Baldacci territory, but done with a refreshing vigour by the California-based Quirk who is making a name for himself as a thriller writer to watch.

7th January 2021

THE DARK ROOM by Sam Blake
(Corvus £12.99, 304 pp)

The Dark room The paths of two determined young women, one from London and the other from New York, cross when they find themselves together in a spooky country house hotel called Hare’s Landing, on the coast of West Cork in Ireland.
Some say it is haunted — certainly there have been many strange events over the years — and it is watched over by a frightening housekeeper, who comes straight from the school of stern ladies such as Mrs Danvers, who sent shivers down the spine in Rebecca.
New York-based crime reporter Caroline Kelly has retreated to the hotel to draw breath, while London-based film location scout Rachel Lambert is investigating the death of a homeless man her husband featured in the TV documentary he was making before he became the victim of a mysterious hit-and-run.
She’s convinced the answer to the mystery lies at Hare’s Landing. Laced with creepy menace and dark characters that live in the mind, it gets under the skin very quickly.

7th January 2021

FOOL ME TWICE by Jeff Lindsay
(Orion £18.99 368 pp)

Fool Me Twice A year ago Lindsay, creator of serial killer and vigilante Dexter, launched an extraordinary new character — master thief and expert at disguise Riley Wolfe. This is his second appearance, and it underlines what an exceptional creation he is.
Here, he’s caught between two ruthless arms dealers, one of whom wants him to steal a Raphael fresco from the Vatican — one of the most secure places in the world.
On the surface it looks impossible, but then the other arms dealer — determined to destroy his rival — forces Wolfe to go through with the plan, no matter how difficult.
Once again, Wolfe recruits his friend and art forger Monique, and he comes up with a scheme. But can it work — given that both men will kill him if he succeeds?
Written with verve, it confirms Wolfe as a great character, a Raffles of his day.

Thrillers Crime

For a synopsis of any of Geoffrey's books, please click on the appropriate cover above.