He Died With His Eyes Open [Mass Market Paperback]

Raymond Derek (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 12, 1988

As it turns out, a dead man can tell stories...

Murders are a dime a dozen in Margaret Thatcher's London, and when it comes to the brutal killing of a middle-aged alcoholic found dumped outside of town, Scotland Yard has more important cases to deal with.

Instead it's a job for the Department of Unexplained Deaths and its head Detective Sergeant. With only a box of cassette-tape diaries as evidence the rogue detective has no chouce but to listen to the haunting voice of the victim for clues to his gruesome end.

The first book in Derek Raymond's acclaimed Factory Series is an unflinching yet deeply compassionate portrait of a city plagued by poverty and perversion, and a policeman who may be the only one who cares about the "people who don't matter and who never did."


From the Trade Paperback edition.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for Derek Raymond's Factory Series

"It’s one of the darkest and most surrealistically hard-boiled things I’ve ever read. The detective is at least as scary as the murderers he’s chasing."
—William Gibson, bestselling author of Neuromancer

"No one claiming interest in literature truly written from the edge of human experience, no one wondering at the limits of the crime novel and of literature itself, can overlook these extraordinary books."
—James Sallis, author of Drive

"The Factory novels are certainly the most viscerally imagined of their kind that I've ever read, or reread multiple times.  Derek Raymond wrote in a supposedly escapist genre in a manner that precluded any hope of escape."
—Scott Phillips, bestselling author of The Ice Harvest

"There remains no finer writing – crime or otherwise – about the state of Britain."
—David Peace, author of "The Red Riding Quartet."

"Carve Derek Raymond’s name into the literary pantheon. He is one of the rare authors who seek to understand evil, ferret out the darkness in human nature, and blast Noir fiction out of the genre ghetto and into Literature. His nameless detective's quest through the bleak streets gets under your skin. Amazing, painful and brilliant."
—Cara Black, bestselling author of Murder at the Lanterne Rouge

"I Was Dora Suarez blew me away - beyond hard boiled."
—Patton Oswalt

"More Chandleresque than Chandler... [Raymond] could write beautifully...and, more importantly, what he is writing about in this novel are nothing less than the important subjects any writer can deal with: mortality and death."
—Will Self

“A crackerjack of a crime novel, unafraid to face the reality of man&rsquo... --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

About the Author

Raymond was born Robin Cook in 1931. He dropped out of Eton aged sixteen and spent much of his early career among criminals. The Factory series followed his early novels, The Crust on Its Uppers and A State of Denmark. His literary memoir The Hidden Files was published in 1992. He died in London in 1994.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback
• Publisher: Ballantine Books (September 12, 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345356837
• ISBN-13: 978-0345356833
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,559,032 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Profoundly unappreciated classic, April 7, 2003

By 

"violence_jack" (Bramalea, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: He Died with His Eyes Open (Paperback)

If you enjoy the stylings of James Ellroy, Iain Banks, or even Raymond Chandler, anything by Derek Raymond is a sure bet. "He Died With His Eyes Open" is a stunning read. It follows the narrator, a nameless English detective, during his pursuit/descent while trying to find those guilty of a violent murder. Through writings and tape-recorded thoughts recovered from the victim, the detective becomes increasingly attached to the persona of the deceased. The prose is stark, elegant, incredibly philsophical, and yields a wealth of great quotes.

Another reviewer on Amazon.com mentioned that the methods of detection were not convincing, and the ending was "over-the-top".
Well...it's certainly not in the vein of an Agatha Christie mystery; It is a rare, brilliant look at the primal underpinnings of "civilized" society. It is classic noir, in the sense that it is a stylistic meditation on the nature of man/good vs. evil, as seen through the eyes of someone who makes a life out of being on the front lines of misery.

"He Died With His Eyes Open" compares more than favorably to Ellroy's "The Black Dahlia", with proper British style.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Start of a Quirky Series, August 21, 2008

By 

Grey Wolffe "Zeb Kantrowitz" (North Waltham, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: He Died with His Eyes Open (Factory 1) (Paperback)

This is a series that lacks a lot of things. The main character lacks a name. He also lacks human emotion and emotional brakes. His life is a random series of inertia. He would rather do nothing, but once he starts, whatever he's doing develops a life of it's own until it comes to a conclusion (not always satisfactorily).

He works as a 'sergeant' in the "Factory" (Metropolitan Police) in the Department of Unexplained Deaths'. Unlike the SCD (Serious Crimes Division) the DUD (get it!) gets the murders of prostitutes, drug addicts and the other detritus of society. The crimes of course are serious but only to those they are perpetrated on.

Our Sergeant is called on to a murder scene of a man found in the bushes just off a main highway (the A2). The man has been beaten brutally (all of his major bones have been broken and then he was hit on the head with a hammer). He has no identification. But he is a nobody. The Sergeant has a nemesis/colleague in SCD who is trying to get him to move up. The Sergeant says, "I like my independence." But what he really likes is to be able to work by himself, drink when he wants and work a case the way he wants.

The Sergeant works his way through the underbelly of late 1950s London. The city is still showing it's ruff edges left over from the War and rationing has just ended. But there is still a large unemployed under- class that lives on the margin of society. This is the Sergeant's milieu and he doesn't want to leave it. It's as much a part of him as he is a part of it.

The story and the solution are no great shakes, but they aren't the reason to read the story. The descriptions of the other side of London at this time in history and the way people lived and spoke is the real reason to read the novel.

Zeb Kantrowitz

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars James M. Cain...on octane, June 27, 2009

By 

Kirk Alex - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: He Died with His Eyes Open (Factory 1) (Paperback)

I can't believe I never knew about this writer until recently...having
accidentally discovered him on the Net.

The only warning here is: once you start reading, you can't stop.

Also, I gave his I WAS DORA SUAREZ five stars. The book is so strong
it just might make a few people vomit.

Would love to get The Hidden Files, only it seems tough to locate here in the
U.S.

Lastly, you might be bummed out to know Raymond died back in l994. At
least we have the books.
Powerful stuff indeed.