This is the one which introduces the terrorist-for-hire Simon Darcourt, who crops up again later in A Snowball in Hell, which I read first. It's also got Angelique. Simon, who's supposed to be dead, has been contracted to carry out some act of demolition in Scotland, but is spotted by an Raymond Ash, an ex-schoolfriend, who thought Simon was dead. Raymond survives a subsequent assassination attempt and abduction, but no-one apart from Angelique believes him when he says he knows what Simon's target is.

Another entertaining read. There's quite a lot of Simon's back-story in this, which probably would have made Snowball more interesting. From what I remember, in that book you got quite a lot of stuff from Simon's PoV, which doesn't happen at all here.

Not sure why it took me so long to read this book, because it was fun. I'm in the middle now of reading Country of the Blind, and because I've been reading so many Brookmyre books this year it's a bit hard to think of things which are unique to each book (apart from the story), but this was on a par with the other stuff, i.e. fun to read.

"Make it" was the command by which their playtime world was shaped, a good dozen years before Captain Picard added the stylish but redundant "so".
"Make it that I've dug a tunnel through intae the sewers an' it comes oot behin' the kitchen bins," Tommy had decreed, before cautioning his fellow captives: "An' make it that I've got tae go ahead masel' an' yous have tae cover up fur me until I come back an' say it's safe."

Completed : 02-May-2011

Completed : 09-Sep-2018