Peter James

Not Dead Yet

Detective Roy Grace

Setting     Brighton

Time        Present
Genre      English Noir

This is the eighth in the Roy Grace novels set in Brighton, so far all including "Dead" in the title.

The plot centres around a Madonna-like mega-star who is in Brighton to film a historical and romantic epic to be filmed in the Brighton Pavilion and whose life is under threat.

There's also a sub plot involving a dismembered corpse found in chicken droppings on a poultry farm. Apparently a separate story from the main plot, James brings them together effectively as the novel comes to its climax

As with most sequences of novels involving the same characters there is a developing story ARC.

Grace's partner, Cleo nears the end of her pregnancy while Grace seeks to have his long missing wife, Sandy, declared dead to enable his marriage to Cleo. The novel starts to reveal more about Sandy's disappearance and her impending threat to Grace's security.

Professionally Grace solves the issue of the embarrassing leaks from his investigations to the local crime reporter Spinelli, This is possibly solved too easily and the uncovering of the guilty party concludes within two chapters with minimum effort to throw suspicion on one of Grace's team.

Rating   A

Peter James' web site

Novels in the sequence read previously
Dead Simple
Looking Good dead
Not Dead Enough
Dead Man's Footsteps
Dead Tomorrow
Dead Like You
Dead Man's Grip