Beneath the Bleeding

For readers of dark, character~driven British crime fiction, Val McDermid's Tony Hill novels have few peers. This fifth book in the series does not disappoint. The story opens with a shocking attack on Tony Hill and moves on to the poisoning of a football star that is frightening in its topicality. The characters are complex and beautifully developed, the prose literate and allusive, the plot marked by unpredictable twists. The book also fills in more of Tony Hill's character with the appearance of his mother for the first time, in scenes that help to explain his troubled psyche. The relationship of Tony and DCI Carole Jordan also moves to a deeper level as her loneliness and battles with alcohol begin to make her face her inner life as well as the complexities of her work. This is mystery writing at its best.