Brother Grimm - Craig Russell

I'm a bit confused... I read this book and it bears no similarity to the review posted. This book was nominated for the CWA Gold Dagger and won the Dagger in the library and a proverbial bucket load of other awards. It is intelligent and a clear step above the normal fare. Comparisons with Mo Hayder and Karin Slaughter are totally misinformed. This is clever, well researched and riveting stuff. No matter what you think of the author (okay, the author is a half-German, ex-police inspector - not exactly who I'd like to spend the evening with) but when he's writing about a half-German police inspector (the Germans call them Kommisars) he is on solid ground. This is ...  Read the complete review

Disney has a lot to answer for with their treatment of fairy tales. When they produced their early feature length cartoons such as 'Snow White' or 'Sleeping Beauty', they choose to adapt the later politically correct version of the tales. Gone were the references to rape, torture, murder etc. to be replaced with singing and dancing animals. I hope that no poor unfortunate child gets their hands on an original version of the Grimm's fairy tales as they will be in for a nasty shock. Many of these tales were violent and could easily impact a vivid imagination. Therefore, it seems inevitable that an author would use these gothic books as inspiration for a serial ...  Read the complete review

Jan Fabel is the Erster Kriminalhauptkommisar and the leader of the Hamburg Murder Squad. Together with his team he starts investigating the murder of a young girl found posed on a lonely stretch of strand in Blanknese, Hamburg. In her hand she clutches a neatly written note which seems to suggest that she may be part of something other than a family argument gone wrong or a sexually motivated murder. When the team believe they may have identified the girl and bring the parents in for an official identification they realise that the killer is playing some sort of game with them. As a couple is murdered in the forest and posed together with some bread ...  Read the complete review