Peter Lovesey

 

DIAMOND AND THE EYE is published in the UK by Sphere on July 8, 2021
and in the US by Soho Press on October 12, 2021

THE SHEAR AMAZING SLEUTH

Of all the weird characters Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond has met in Bath, this one is the most extreme: a twenty-first century private eye called Johnny Getz, whose office is over Shear Amazing, a hairdressing salon. Johnny has been hired by Ruby Hubbard, whose father, an antiques shop owner, has gone missing, and Johnny insists on involving ‘Pete’ in his investigation.

When Diamond, Johnny and Ruby enter the shop, they find a body and a murder investigation is launched. Diamond is forced to house his team in the dilapidated Corn Market building across the street. His problems grow when his boss appoints Lady Bede, from the Police Ethics Committee, as an observer. Worse still, Johnny conducts his own inquiry by latching onto Ruby’s stylish friend, a journalist called Olympia.

Shootings from a drive-by gunman at key players create mayhem and the pressure is really on. Can the team stop more killings in this normally peaceful city? What happened to Ruby’s father? And will Johnny crack the case before Diamond does?

This is the twentieth Peter Diamond novel. Books in the series have twice won the Crime Writers’ Association Silver Dagger as well as the Anthony, Barry and Macavity awards and been shortlisted for the Edgar and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Peter is the only living British author to have been honoured with the two top honours in crime writing: the CWA/Cartier Diamond Dagger and Grand Master of the Mystery Writers of America.

Here’s a dip into the opening page:

‘Mind if I join you?’
Peter Diamond’s toes curled.
There’s no escape when you’re wedged into your favourite armchair in the corner of the lounge bar at the Francis observing the last rites of an exhausting week keeping a cap on crime. Tankard in hand, your third pint an inch from your mouth, you want to be left alone.
The stranger’s voice was throaty, the accent faux American from a grainy black-and-white film a lifetime ago. This Bogart impersonator was plainly as English as a cricket bat. His face wasn’t Bogart’s and he wasn’t talking through tobacco smoke, but he held a cocktail stick between two fingers as if it was a cigarette. Some years the wrong side of forty, he was dressed in a pale grey suit and floral shirt open at the neck to display a miniature magnifying glass on a leather cord.
‘Depends,’ Diamond said.
‘On what?’
‘Should I know you?’
‘No reason you should, bud.’
No one called Diamond ‘bud’. He’d have said so, but the soundtrack had already moved on.
‘I got your number. You’re the top gumshoe in this one-horse town and you’re here in the bar Friday nights when you’re not tied up on a case. What’s your poison? I’ll get you another.’
‘Don’t bother.’ Diamond wasn’t getting suckered into getting lumbered with a bar-room bore who called him bud and claimed to have got his number.
‘You’ll need something strong when you hear what I have to say.’ The bore pulled up a chair and the voice became even more husky. ‘Good to meet you, any road. I’m Johnny Getz, the private eye.’
‘Say that again, the last part.’
‘Private eye.’
Against all the evidence that this was a send-up, Diamond had to hear more. ‘Private eye? I thought they went out with Dick Tracy.’
‘Dick Tracy was a cop.’
‘Sam Spade, then. We’re talking private detectives, are we? I didn’t know we had one in Bath.’
‘What do you mean – “one”? I could name at least six others. The difference is they’re corporate. I’m the real deal. I work alone.’
‘Where?’
‘Over the hairdresser’s in Kingsmead Square.’ An address that lacked something compared to a seedy San Francisco side-street, which was probably why the self-styled private eye added, ‘The Shear Amazing Sleuth. Like it?’

 

Into The Tunnel Of Death

The Finisher was published in paperback in the UK on March 11, 2021.

 
Fifty years after his career was launched with Wobble to Death, Peter returns to running as a theme in his new book The Finisher.

A killer strikes in the Bath half-marathon. No one in the local CID understands at first why Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond is so agitated when he sees Tony Pinto paying unwanted attention to a young woman soon after the start. But Diamond remembers putting Pinto away for a vicious attack on a student, and now the man is on parole after years of good behaviour. Diamond’s fixation with this ex-convict will bring him into trouble from every side, including his boss Georgina and police headquarters.

Unknown to anyone at this stage, a murderer known as the Finisher has already been active in the city. Will the next victim be Maeve, who is running to salve her conscience after accidentally destroying a valuable item intended for charity? Olga, a rich Russian determined to shed weight and streamline her figure? Belinda, a painfully shy IT expert taking part in memory of her mother? Or Spiro, an Albanian fugitive on the run from modern slavery?

First, Diamond must prove that murder has been done and then discover where the corpse is hidden, a dangerous quest that leaves him with a crippling injury. Only he can unmask the Finisher …

The Critics’ Verdict on The Finisher

‘A story full of surprises, The Finisher is one of Peter Lovesey’s best, which is saying a lot for a prolific author who has attracted a galaxy of star ratings.’ Barry Turner in the Daily Mail

‘In a peerlessly plotted mystery, Lovesey brings back his prickly rule-abhoring detective, Peter Diamond of the Bath police, who’s investigating a murder at a half-marathon. As readers who love the Diamond series know, the picture-perfect old British city, honeycombed with sluices, drains and sewers, offers unrivaled facilities for disposing of bodies. “The light and dark imagery is a fixture of Bath novels,” Marilyn Stasio writes in her crime column, “in which life is lived on many levels, some in full sunshine and others buried in shadow.’ Gregory Cowles in The New York Times

‘MWA Grand Master Lovesey’s masterly, atmospheric 19th investigation for Bath, England, Det Supt Peter Diamond . . . Lovesey neatly ties together all the disparate threads as the plot twists and turns to its taut conclusion. On the 50th anniversary of the publication of his first novel, Lovesey is still going strong.’ Publishers Weekly (starred review)

‘It is 50 years since Lovesey’s first novel, which also featured running. British mystery fiction’s reigning head of state returns to that sporting setting with his customary wit, humanity and unpredictable turns of plot.’ Mat Coward in The Morning Star

‘Threaded through this elegantly written mystery are vivid and timely subplots concerning Russian oligarchs and Albanian fugitives from modern slavery gangs. Peter Lovesey may now be in his 80s, but he tells his tale with all the verve and wit of a much younger man.’ Myles McWeeney in The Irish Independent

‘A witty, steadily absorbing procedural marked by Lovesey’s customary inventiveness and an unguessable solution.’ Kirkus Reviews

‘There’s a deeply satisfying symmetry in Peter Lovesey’s The Finisher, bringing the prolific and much-honored British writer’s 50-year career full circle by echoing his debut. His witty, low-key police detective, D.S. Peter Diamond, is leading security for a charity race, the Other Half, in his home city of Bath. . . . Throughout, Diamond remains his usual appealing self, and Lovesey retains his knack for tight plotting and supple prose.’ Adam Woog in The Seattle Times

‘Lovesey’s mystery fans will be sorry when The Finisher is over . . . On the 50th anniversary of his first novel, the British writer has created a brisk, colorful page-turner centered on mayhem at the springtime half-marathon in the city of Bath . . . Mr Lovesey’s descriptive passages will have armchair explorers champing at the bit.’ Robert Croan in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette

‘I came away impressed by the storytelling, the relative pace of the plot and of the frequent twists and turns that made this a compelling read.’ Malavika Praseed in the Chicago Review of Books

‘This is a story firmly set in the present day (or at least the immediate pre-pandemic present day!), but Peter Lovesey’s storytelling skills, and certainly his gift for constructing a fair-play puzzle, match those of the finest exponents of Golden Age fiction.’ Martin Edwards in Do You Write Under Your Own Name?

‘Lovesey brilliantly weaves all these disparate characters and storylines into a wonderfully entertaining and compelling story. His work is the gold standard for UK crime fiction writing.’ George Easter in Deadly Pleasures

‘There are those among us who would read Lovesey if he took to writing on the backs of cereal boxes. Blessedly, that hasn’t happened. Instead, we have the nineteenth novel featuring His Grumpiness, Detective Inspector Peter Diamond of the Bath Constabulary. All the signature elements of this acclaimed series are present: the gin-dry humor, the engaging characters, the ending that kills you before you know you’re dead. . . . Slowly, but with relentless pacing and magical writing – a rusty hinge “groans like a soul in torment” – the plotlines converge. Surprises abound, like the corpse with a mind of its own. Lovesey likes to tease his detective, describing him as “out of a ’40s film, a sleuth on the trail of Sidney Greenstreet.” But the finale reminds us that Diamond is a relentless, hard-edged, strictly business copper.’ Don Crinklaw in Booklist (starred review)