Customer Reviews

Bloodline

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Serial killers. The gift that keeps on giving. Fifteen years earlier London had been horrified by a string of gruesome murders perpetrated by Raymond Garvey. Three years ago Garvey dies in prison from a massive brain tumor. Now X-ray fragments found clutched in the hands of a new series of victims suggests someone is targeting the children of Garvey's victims. As Tom Thorne applies his particular talent for solving unusual murders to the new cases, it is apparent why Billingham is such a popular crime writer in England. Unsettled by a recent turn in his relationship with Louise Porter, a detective in another department, Thorne is frequently distracted by the tragedy the couple has faced, both parties still tentative with one another. At the same time, his instincts are critical in understanding this murderer's bizarre scenario, the crooked paths of this killer's mind. Thorne wants to get inside the brain of the murderer- but only deep enough to catch him. A bit standoffish to other detectives, Thorne is nevertheless thorough and well-respected. That his interior conflicts are revealed only humanizes this protagonist, making him a sympathetic character with an apt name.

Serial killers fascinate scientists, baffle law enforcement and terrify the public, but generate a lot of press, civic paranoia rising with each new murder, as well as pressure on the authorities to catch the killer. Billingham balances all these aspects in a tight plot with the odd bit of black humor to relieve the tension. The quirky Thorne is drawn to the hunt, the murderer's mind set haunting his thoughts on and off the job: "It's dark beats, the twisted melody of it. Like the first song you hear on the radio every morning that stays in your head all day." Familiar territory to this detective, never a disappointment to fans who expect a riveting denouement. Luan Gaines/2011.

As a devoted fan of Mr Billingham's Tom Thorne series, I was disappointed that I could not find this newest novel in the series--that is until I went to Amazon and bought it from an individual. Fast shipping, book in brand new shape. Thank you a million times over that I did not have to wait until it was released in the U.S. I will do business with this person again. This is a thriller, police procedural with lots of suspense and plot twists throughout. I love this author and read anything and everything he writes. The Tom Thorne detective series is one of my favorites.

In Whittington Hospital, police Detective Inspector Tom Thorne struggles with his girlfriend Detective Inspector Louise Porter's miscarriage. Thus when his superior DCI Brigstocke informs him of a homicide, he welcomes a new case to take his mind off the tragedy.

In her home in Finchley, someone battered Emily Walker before suffocating her with plastic. Thorne looks at the murder scene, which is clearly that of domestic violence. However, he learns that a twenty-something nurse was murdered in the same manner three weeks ago in Leicester City. Further inquiry into the pasts of two dead females links them when both their mothers and five other women were murdered fifteen years ago by the late serial killer Raymond Garvey. As more offspring of Garvey's victims are murdered, a copycat psychopath is on the loose.

The latest Thorne British police procedural (see Death Message) is an engaging suspense filled investigation. The protagonist does not cope well with the miscarriage and though he relishes the case to keep his mind off dark personal thoughts, he also feels a bit guilty for his euphoria over corpses appearing in London. Although the nibbles from the soul of the psychopath never feel adequate as with the Lay's commercial a few chips is not enough (either more or none is needed). Still sub-genre readers will want to join the DI as he investigates the copy cat serial killings.

Harriet Klausner

"He remembered some movie where the cop would stand in the houses where people had been murdered and commune with the killer....For Thorne, it just came down to wanting to know something about the victim...Something simple and stupid would usually do it. A picture on a bedroom wall. The biscuits they kept in the kitchen cupboard or the book that they would never finish reading...As for what went on in the mind of the killer, Thorne was happy knowing just enough to catch him and no more."

Emily Watson has been brutally murdered. There is no sign of forced entry so the obvious conclusion is that Emily knew her killer. As expected, the first suspect is her husband, but when a time of death is narrowed, George Watson has a perfect alibi. A teacher at a nearby school, George comes home for lunch everyday, stays an hour, and returns home for the day in mid-afternoon, except on Wednesday when he supervises a chess club. Emily is killed on a Wednesday; the killer has taken the time to know the Watsons' schedule. Clutched in the palm of her hand, is a piece of film cut from an xray. When other bodies are discovered, killed in the same way, another piece of the xray folded into the palm, the police, and the public, realize there is a serial killer at large. As the identities of the victims, male and female, are revealed, the murders take on an even more bizarre element. Each victim is the child of a woman murdered by Raymond Garvey over fifteen years ago. Garvey has died in prison but there are no shortage of books written about the murders. Someone is using the information about the Garvey killings as a script for these new murders.

Garvey killed seven women. Thorne and his team have to find the copycat killer but they also have to find the other potential victims before the killer does.

I have enjoyed all the books in the Tom Thorne series and I look forward to more. If a formula works for an author and for the reader, it doesn't seem that there is anything wrong with the author using a template that pleases most who will read the book. It isn't possible for everyone to be pleased all the time so every time an author launches a book, it is as if the author is taking a high dive into a pool with circling sharks. When I discover an author who is new to me, if there is a series, I start at the beginning. I don't read the books in the series, one immediately after another. It keeps the series fresher for the reader; if there are flaws from one book to another, they aren't glaring.

Mark Billingham is an exceptional writer; each of the books in the Thorne series offers new puzzles and new insights into the characters. After reading BLOODLINE, I looked at reviews of the book posted on Amazon UK. More than a few critiques were aimed at Mr. Billingham's series, carping about "formula" and "predictability" rather than discussing this one book. The Tom Thorne series is one of the best available and the books are satisfying from beginning to end. Billingham has devised plots in various books that include inducing locked-in syndrome, serial killers working in tandem, street people and Gulf Was veterans being killed seemingly without motive, and guilty people being convicted for crimes they didn't commit while escaping justice for the ones they did. I look forward to more about Thorne and the interesting characters, Holland, Hendricks, Louise, and others who people the stories.

Clasped in the hand of the victim is a sliver of an x-ray. Warning bells ring loudly in Detective Tom Thorne's head - is this the start of a hunt for a serial killer?

As odd pieces of film is found at other crime scenes Thorne, searching for links between the victims, discovers that perhaps the bludgeoned bodies are not as random as first thought. In fact, it goes back to another killer from the 1980s - Raymond Garvey. Garvey, who terrorized and killed seven women in four months. But as similar as these new killings are to the ones committed by Garvey - he's dead. Who's responsible this time? Is Detective Thorne dealing with a copycat?

Perhaps it's a cliche to describe a Billingham novel as tense and gritty - but that's what they are! Just sheer genius. I love how this story is written in a way that you're mulling along with the odd touch of drama when a body is found and before you know it you're almost at the end of the novel and your mind starts to race - is Thorne going to get this killer? The authors descriptions of characters, places and murders brings them scarily alive. You're immediately drawn in and can vividly see what Billingham is driving at.

Tom Thorne is a brilliant character - complex, a little bit rough and a dedicated policeman. Over the years, Billingham has allowed the reader to discover what lies below the surface of Thorne, what makes him tick, yet it feels like there is so much more to understand about this experienced detective. Great stuff.

If you're new to Mark Billingham, I suggest you start with Sleepyhead and work your way to this, another explosive Thorne drama.

With a few twists and turns, Bloodline is a story of family loyalty gone awry; a stylish thriller that delves in to the murkier side of London - a highly recommended read!

Mark Billingham is a UK writer who is very, very good. This is his 9th book and the 8th to feature Detective Inspector Tom Thorne.

Thorne is a character along the same lines as Ian Rankin's Inspector Rebus (Rankin is another master), if you like one, you will like the other. Thorne's London is not a pretty place and the world he does his work in can be quite bleak.

In this novel, people are being killed and the bodies are being left with a small piece of an x-ray in their hands. What is the reason for this and is there a common thread to the killings?

The story is entertaining and fast-paced, Thorne and the rest of the cast tend to be easy to read about and likable. The mystery is not that difficult to figure out but this is not the main thing, it is the writing of Billingham that always gets me involved. Another plus to his writing is that there is a realism to it, Thorne is no superhero, he is an ordinary man with personal demons.

I think Mark Billingham is getting better with each novel he writes and that is a very good thing for readers of quality fiction.

When a woman is killed in her home with a small piece of plastic found clenched in her hand, DCI Tom Thorne is hard pressed to understand the motive behind her murder or who the murderer might be. He is, however, surprised to discover her mother had been one of the women killed by a serial killer, Raymond Garvey fifteen years ago. But when another woman's murder is brought to his attention, also with a piece of plastic in her hand, the plastic later found to be a piece of an x-ray film, and is discovered also to have been the daughter of another victim of Garvey that DCI Thorne starts to suspect he may have another serial killer on his hand.

He researches the victims of Raymond Garvey and the man himself. In the meantime, a pair of siblings are also murdered in their home, also children of another of Garvey's victims. The race is now on to identify and find the surviving children of all the Garvey victims since they appear to be the target. But who's trying to kill them and why?

As DCI Thorne and his team pursue all possible clues in their investigation, they are constantly a few steps behind the killer. He engages a retired colleague to help with some of the research into Garvey and his past.

In the meantime, we are presented with a possible defense for Garvey through some journal entries by the killer himself. Was he really responsible for killing all those women?

The identity of the new serial killer eludes us all until the very end. DCI Thorne isn't Sherlock Holmes, he makes mistakes, he has personal problems to deal with, and he has a list of people he needs to try and protect from a serial killer. But can he, and will he get the killer before it's too late?

Mark Billingham's new novel "Bloodline" is the latest in the DI Tom Thorne series. Thorne, a Detective Inspector, has already worked on - 15 years in the past - worked on the capture of a serial killer who killed seven women. The murderer, Raymond Garvey, died in prison a few years later of a brain tumor.

But the brutal killings didn't stop. A few years after Garvey's death, new bodies are being found in various parts of London, men this time as well as women victims, each clutching a piece of an X-ray. When police work turns up a definite link between the victims, Thorne is brought into the investigation; a hunt for a murderer undertaken while Thorne works on some sticky personal issues with his partner, Louise.

Billingham does an excellent job telling of the non-CSI aspects of police work. Tracking down a killer is sort of like trying to do a jigsaw puzzle without having a picture of puzzle to work with. Leads come after much searching and a bad call can cause an investigation to veer off into a dead-end. Personality conflicts are ever present and can occur easily between cops, victims, and killers.

Mark Billingham has written several novels previous to "Bloodline". To those readers like me who have never read Billingham's work, reading this latest was sort of like walking into a movie in the middle and not knowing the plot and the characters. This is a hazard for an author-with-a-series; how to bring new readers up-to-speed about the main and secondary characters while keeping the book from being boring to those continuing readers. Billingham does a pretty good job at this, though I think I'd advise a novice-Billingham reader to start with the first book in his Thorne series. Though I found this book very good.

*The Crowgrrl recently was able to sink her fangs into a truly refreshing action/mystery - Bloodlines by Mark Billingham (Mulholland Books/Hatchet Book Group). The riveting plotline kept the serial killer a couple of steps ahead of both the police and the reader throughout, and you never see the twists at the end (which I'm not going to spoil) coming!

Originally attracted by the title - which is also the title of my favorite Slayer song which kept running through my head every time I picked the book up - we find that this story is very aptly named!

The tale is interspersed with glimpses at the future through the eyes of an intended victim fleeing with her special-needs son, and glances at the past as the killer reminisces about visits with his father in prison. We also see pages straight from the killer's own diary, understanding his twisted motives a bit more clearly.

Detective Tom Thorne - while facing the personal tragedy of his wife, Louise, having a miscarriage - is heading an investigation into a murder that at first glance looked like the result of a domestic dispute, except for the fact that the victim was clutching a piece of an x-ray in her hand. Ironically, her mother had been murdered in a similar fashion 15 years prior to this tragedy. Then a second, third, and fourth victim follow, with the same M.O. and pieces of the same x-ray in their hands with another similarity between them - each of them had a parent murdered 15 years prior by convicted serial killer, Ray Garvey.

Garvey's reign of terror left seven women dead. Someone claiming to be Garvey's son had unsuccessfully tried to clear his father's name, saying the brain tumor that Garvey died from in prison was the cause of the murderous spree, that Garvey Senior was not in control of his actions. This mysterious offspring then embarks on his own rampage, taunting yet eluding the police at every turn. The macabre calling card he leaves is the jigsaw-puzzle pieces of Garvey's brain tumor x-ray. Thorne scrambles in an inevitable race against time to find the children of Garvey's victims and try to get them to safety.

The race against time in this thriller was absolutely spellbinding! The Crowgrrl is a bit rusty on my "Brit-Speak", so had to re-read a few lines over, which slowed me down just a little. But I still couldn't turn those pages fast enough to find out what was going to happen.

Originally from Birmingham, the now London-based author Mark Billingham is also an actor and stand-up comedian. He also wrote the Triskellion series of children's thrillers under the pseudonym Will Peterson.

Apparently there are several books in the Tom Thorne saga dating back to 2001, but Bloodline is the first The Crowgrrl has stumbled across. You can bet I'm seriously going to do some back-tracking to devour the others in this delicious series. A TV series based on this protagonist, Thorne, debuted in October 2010 on Sky 1 in the UK, and with any luck, maybe we can hope BBC America might have the good sense to pick it up. (At the very least, I'd love to see it on DVD.) It stars David Morrissey- who is also the executive producer - in the title role.

Mark Billingham has been on my "must-read" list of authors since I first encountered SLEEPYHEAD, his debut novel and the introduction to the Tom Thorne series. I was hooked from the first paragraph and have remained so ever since. Thorne, a British detective inspector, is a quietly tragic and driven figure --- uncomfortably likable might be a good description --- whose prickly personality and keen intelligence both attracts and repels, sometimes simultaneously. At his core, however, he cares deeply about the victims and, more particularly, their survivors, so that his blessing and curse is that he is unable to bring any sort of detachment to his job. But the best characters would be lost without a solid storyline and intriguing plot, and Billingham has provided both through seven Thorne novels.

After a detour through last year's edgy stand-alone work, IN THE DARK (which includes a cameo appearance by Thorne), Billingham returns to a full focus on Thorne with what is surely his best work to date. Shot full with brilliant pacing, surprise twists, and pitch-black humor that is both chilling and funny, BLOODLINE is one of those books that you will want to read at least twice: once for enjoyment and absorption, and once to see precisely how Billingham brings it all so frighteningly and wonderfully together.

Following an enigmatic prologue that becomes all-too-clear comes tale's end, Billingham opens BLOODLINE with Thorne and his latest soul mate, Louise, experiencing a personal tragedy. Thorne has little time to dwell on it --- though dwell he does, throughout the book --- when he is called to the scene of a young wife's murder. Her husband is quickly eliminated as a suspect, while her death is found to have a link to a previous killing, as well as to the subsequent double murder of a brother and sister. All of the murders share a bizarre history with a series of infamous killings committed by notorious British serial killer Raymond Garvey, who terrorized Great Britain a couple of decades before with an elongated murder spree before being captured, tried and convicted. His actions spawned a small industry of true crime books, but, for all of his notoriety, Garvey died in prison. It now appears that someone is emulating Garvey's behavioral pattern in the worst way possible.

Thorne and his colleagues, pressed to bring the perpetrator to justice, have their work cut out for them. They know there will be more murders and are even aware of who the victims will be and the identity of the murderer. They cannot, however, locate either the doer or the potential victims. The killer is as clever and diabolical a character as Thorne has ever encountered, and all of his resources, as well as that of the department, are taxed to the limit in attempting to apprehend him. Meanwhile, the perpetrator is taunting the police with clues left at the scene of the crime that indicate why he is doing all this. And while Thorne and the squad are looking for him and the other potential victims, he is watching them, letting them lead him to the next victim. Thus each step Thorne takes toward the killer leads the killer to the next murder. The result is a tale that grows more intense page by page, with one of the most striking endings you will read this year. Guaranteed.

BLOODLINE is not for the squeamish, though the graphic descriptions of violence and its aftermath are not gratuitous. Billingham's sense of humor is at the forefront of his narrative, perhaps more so than any of his other works, yet the book is anything but comedic. The gallows mirth that is found throughout is offered primarily as a momentary and temporary respite from the grimness of its subject matter from beginning to end. Billingham has never been as bittersweet, tragic and powerful as he is here.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub