Bill James

Astride a Grave

A Harpur & Iles Mystery

The antic, murderous gang who took that Exeter bank for £1.8 million are at it again.

"Caring" Oliver Leach, the brains of the operation, is rumored to have taken off to the Continent with a good bit more than his share of the loot, so some freelancers who know about the job kidnap his daughter on spec. Meanwhile, as Harpur and his colleagues take turns holding the marble hand of Patsy Leach, who's convinced that her daughter has kidnapped herself, Caring's old mate Ralph Ember knows the kidnapping will never work, since he's already killed Caring himself... (Kirkus Reviews)

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.

More books by Bill James

Originally published in 1991
1996 / hardcover / ISBN 0-88150-361-4 / 6" x 8" / Mystery