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Rating: 
Summary: Bill Slider is back - just as good
Review: Bill Slider, the London Police Inspector from Shepherd's Bush is back - called to a investigate the death of a man found burned in a fire at a motel. One thing I'll say for Harrod-Eagles is she doesn't muck around before introducing the crimes in her novels and I do like that. The crime is done and you get the rest of the book to sift through the past with the detective.The body might or might not have been suicide and Slider's superiors with the Police are pressuring him to call it suicide - thus saving valuable budget dollars. Slider isn't so keen to do that - there are too many anomalies in the case. The body proves to be that of a known lothario, Richard (Dick) Neal and as usual there are suspects aplenty to be interviewed and eliminated. However a stranger and more sinister pattern starts to show up - what is happening to the members of the Red Watch which manned Shaftesbury Street Fire Station in the 1970's? Meanwhile Slider's marriage is coming apart and his affair with Joanna is deepening. This part I find hard to understand - Joanna's patience with him - Slider's vacillations. It doesn't convince me really. In fact I find Slider's personal life a bit of a jarring distraction to the main story. I do like the way the story unfolds and things that are significant are often revealed early on but are only glaringly obvious in the last few pages. I do think Harrod-Eagles can write a great mystery. This is the second book in the Bill Slider mystery series, by the way - the first is Orchestrated Death.
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