Books
The Demands

by Mark Billingham
Mulholland, June 2012, $24.99

Mark Billingham’s British police procedurals featuring Detective Inspector Tom Thorne are marvels of taut suspense and imaginative plots. In Billingham’s hands, the unconventional becomes believable, from the villain putting his victims in a comatose state in Sleepyhead to From the Dead’s killer targeting families of serial killer victims. While Billingham’s tenth Thorne novel starts as a conventional hostage novel, The Demands is anything but usual. Billingham skillfully sculpts a complex plot that explores guilt, cultural differences, and injustice.

Javed Akhtar has demanded Thorne come to his London news shop where he is holding two hostages, a male bank executive and Detective Sergeant Helen Weeks. Javed wants Thorne to prove that his 16-year-old son, Amin, did not commit suicide while serving an eight-year sentence in the Barndale Young Offenders Institution. Thorne knows his original investigation was solid, but be- gins to question how Amin’s case was handled once it got to court. The young man did kill another, but he was defending a friend. Javed maintains he only wants the truth about his son, but, as the detective begins to dismantle Amin’s life, Thorne doubts this father can handle the truth.

Billingham keeps the tension high as The Demands briskly moves from the claustrophobic news shop where the tension between Javed and his captives increases to the maneuvers among the tactical teams and a hostage negotiator outside. A case being reinvestigated under pressure isn’t a new idea, but Billingham makes The Demands a complex look at the British legal system and an exploration of the corrupting power of secrets.

Oline H. Cogdill

Mark Billingham’s British police procedurals featuring Detective Inspector Tom Thorne are marvels of taut suspense and imaginative plots. In Billingham’s hands, the unconventional becomes believable, from the villain putting his victims in a comatose state in Sleepyhead to From the Dead’s killer targeting families of serial killer victims. While Billingham’s tenth Thorne novel starts as a conventional hostage novel, The Demands is anything but usual. Billingham skillfully sculpts a complex plot that explores guilt, cultural differences, and injustice.

Javed Akhtar has demanded Thorne come to his London news shop where he is holding two hostages, a male bank executive and Detective Sergeant Helen Weeks. Javed wants Thorne to prove that his 16-year-old son, Amin, did not commit suicide while serving an eight-year sentence in the Barndale Young Offenders Institution. Thorne knows his original investigation was solid, but be- gins to question how Amin’s case was handled once it got to court. The young man did kill another, but he was defending a friend. Javed maintains he only wants the truth about his son, but, as the detective begins to dismantle Amin’s life, Thorne doubts this father can handle the truth.

Billingham keeps the tension high as The Demands briskly moves from the claustrophobic news shop where the tension between Javed and his captives increases to the maneuvers among the tactical teams and a hostage negotiator outside. A case being reinvestigated under pressure isn’t a new idea, but Billingham makes The Demands a complex look at the British legal system and an exploration of the corrupting power of secrets.

Teri Duerr
2691

by Mark Billingham
Mulholland, June 2012, $24.99

Billingham
June 2012
the-demands
24.99
Mulholland