Blue Rondo - Tapa dura

The 50s atmosphere is acutely reproduced by John Lawton, and there is a ripe stench of corruption all around as lucrative post-war redevelopment gets under way...Classy stuff. (Matthew Lewin GUARDIAN (23.4.05))

John Lawton has created, in Freddie Troy one of the most intriguing detectives in modern crime fiction...Lawton's writing is hypnotic...he deserves to be ranked with the best. (Mike Ripley BIRMINGHAM POST (30.4.05))

The period atmosphere, illustrated with credible characters, is impeccable and the writing elegantly precise. (Susanna Yager TELEGRAPH)

[this] book has a pace and a flavour that is racy, rakish and addictive. (LITERARY REVIEW (June 2005))

Lawton's fiction is clearly comparable to Jake Arnott's, both in the period it covers and in reworking the stories of real people. The difference is that whereas Arnott earnestly attempts a counter-history of the post-war decades, Lawton seems more intent on having fun with them through a kind of fantastic reinvention. (John Dugdale SUNDAY TIMES (29.5.05))

It's a sprightly, captivating mix, stylishly written...This guy is seriously good. (www.twbooks.co.uk)

The new 'Troy' from John Lawton is a gem. The backdrop is London in the late 1950s. The East End is ripe for redevelopment; the property sharks are buying up the bombsites and Victorian terraces; corruption is rife; Macmillan is PM of a shaky Tory government; Gaitskell expects to succeed as the first Labour PM for almost a decade to the delight of Troy's brothers, one an MP, the other a Fleet Street editor. Troy's last big case (told in Lawton's OLD FLAMES) had been to protect the Russian leaders, Bulganin and Khrushchev, on their first visit to Britain in 1956. Now a series of increasingly sadistic murders occurs on his old East End patch; a wartime girlfriend, who became a GI bride - since married to a Democratic Presidential candidate - reappears into his life. Nor is she the only woman to occupy his bed in the tiny house in Goodwin's Court, St Martin's Lane. When 'Ike', the retiring US President, makes a farewell visit to London, all Troy's worlds combine in a frightening cresendo of corruption and violence. The title, Blue Rondo, is taken from a Dave Brubeck record.