In a Dry Season by Peter Robinson

[dawnbirduk]

An amazing book, Peter Robinson really excelled himself here, I had difficulty putting it down.

 

 

From Good Reads - On the outs with their superiors, Detective Inspector Banks and Detective Sergeant Annie Cabbot are lumbered with a case that is supposed to frustrate and annoy them--and find the challenge fascinating. When a reservoir dries out, a flooded village emerges and a boy finds a skeleton buried in an outhouse--by solid police work, and the use of experts, Banks and Cabbot find out who she was and when she died, and then have to find out why. The reader knows more than they do of course--elderly crime writer Vivien has written her own account of what happened during World War Two when she was an intense unhappy teenager, and this is presented in alternate chapters--but there are surprises still in store... An intense sense of period and a celebration of the virtues of solid investigation, this admirable combination of the police procedural and the psychological period thriller was nominated for the Edgar, the US crime writers' best of the year award. Peter Robinson's acute portrayal of his flawed, humane detectives and the charismatic doomed victim the truth of whose death they are trying to uncover has a desperate sadness which comes together in a climax of unexpected power.

[Readwine]

Dawn, I challenged myself this year to read the whole of the Inspector Banks series. I am enjoying it. However, after reading several, In a Dry Season really took me by surprise as it is so different to the others in the series. I almost felt that someone else wrote it and Robinson lent his name to the novel. Its writing style is different as well as the structure, so I will admit that it is my least favorite in the series. Perhaps, had I read this one first, I would not have something else to compare it too.

[ian]

I read, I think, 3 or 4 Peter Robinson books, of which this is one. While I agree with Readwine that the style is different to the other books I've read, it didn't make me like it any less. One of my minor irritations with Peter Robinson is that the way he portrays the area and people in his books seem a little old-fashioned. They seem to hack back to the 1970's IMHO, so maybe writing about the 1940's comes more naturally?

Nevertheless, I enjoyed this particular book - I liked the way it kept jumping back to the 1940's and slowly revealed the story. While I don't go out of my way to find more Peter Robinson, I always pick up his books when I come across them in the library of charity shop (which is where most of my books are sourced).

 

 

Ian