Careless Love

A DCI Banks Novel

By: Peter Robinson

Narrated by: Simon Prebble

His fans include Stephen King, Michael Connelly, Tess Gerritsen, Ian Rankin, and Louise Penney. He has won acclaim and numerous international prizes and awards, including the Edgar. Now, Peter Robinson, one of the world’s greatest suspense writers, returns with a powerful mystery in which his legendary Detective Superintendent Alan Banks must solve two perplexing crimes.

Two suspicious deaths challenge DS Alan Banks and his crack investigative team.

A young local student’s body is found in an abandoned car on a lonely country road. The death looks like suicide, but there are too many open questions for Banks and his team to rule out foul play. The victim didn’t own a car. She didn’t even drive. How did she get there? Where—and when—did she die? Did someone move her, and if so, why?

A man in his sixties is found dead in a gully up on the wild moorland. He is wearing an expensive suit and carrying no identification. Post mortem findings indicate that he died from injuries sustained during a fall. Was it an accident—did he slip and fall? Or was he pushed? Why was he up there? And why are there no signs of a vehicle near where he fell?

As the inconsistencies multiply and the mysteries surrounding these two cases proliferate, a source close to Annie reveals a piece of information that shocks the team and impacts the investigations. An old enemy has returned in a new guise—a nefarious foe who will stop at nothing, not even murder, to get what he wants.

With the stakes raised, the hunt is on. But will Banks be able to find the evidence to stop him in time?

Slower than molasses in winter

When I started this book, I kept going with it thinking that it had to speed up at some point. It did not. The plot outlines for this series sounded pretty interesting but after struggling through this one, I cancelled my pre-order and removed the other titles from my Wish List. You can skip a few chapters and still not lose any of the plot.

Skillful writing but a bit dull IMO

I like a little more of a challenge than this - we really don’t need quite so much handholding and explanation/exposition - it feels like this guy is writing for a 6yo or something. Nothing offensive, and again skillful composition, but man I just kept waiting for it to get more interesting...
not worth going into the details but this could have been edited down to like a quarter of the length and maybe would have been more compelling. Seems like he’s calling it in to me, just milking it and trying to keep the story going for as long as possible. But at the end of the day, he’s a great author I’m sure. We all need to make a living!

The list after list of music titles and performers is a drag.

I know the stories would be significantly shorter but much more enjoyable to me with much less of the music and literary information. It almost feels like filler anyway. In spite of that, this was an interesting mystery, thank goodness.

A good DCI Banks yarn though not my favorite

A little more predictable than most but a good story. All my favorite characters. I would have liked a bit more detail about how the court case against the doctor went down but it was enjoyable as always with the best reader of this series, Simon Prebble.

Banks reviews of music

The subject matter is sad, but believable. The resolution made perfect sense, one that most readers were expecting, but didn’t mind the ride to get there!