One Night Only by G.P. Ritchie

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One Night Only by G.P. Ritchie

Life is precious. That’s why they take it.

As a boy, Andy Lorimar loved puzzles, but one he didn’t solve destroyed his childhood. It would have taken his future too, if he hadn’t found stability within the police service. Now a long-serving Edinburgh detective, he’s built a solitary existence following evidence to find the truth.

Genre: Crime / Horror / Speculative

After the horrific murder of a city councillor and the disappearance of a council employee, the trail of evidence points towards political corruption. But Andy suspects there may be another path to uncover, a shadow-maze stretching back years into darkness. A path that strays uncomfortably close to a woman who hears the voices of the dead.

My Review

I’m still reeling from reading this book. It’s unlike anything else I’ve ever read. Yes it’s a crime thriller, but add in a deranged, mad scientist, and a medium who knows where the bodies are buried, and you have a match made in heaven. Or is it hell?

Our main protagonist is Edinburgh detective Andy Lorimar. Older and wiser than most of his colleagues, his past comes back to haunt him when he becomes part of an investigation into the horrific murder of a local councillor. And it seems that her past is also mysterious.

Cllr Joan Wood was run down in the street, dragged along and run back over. It can’t have been an accident. But what possible motive could someone have had for killing her? Then others are missing, including one of her colleagues – it must be connected.

In the meantime, Andy meets Doirin, a medium who hears the voices of the dead. But is she for real? Apart from a tipple of gin, she has nothing to help her, and her insight is too realistic to be imagined. Andy is sceptical, but also open to hearing what she has to say.

There’s also a horrific scene that takes place in an underground theatre, involving a man called ‘John’, who is enticed off the street to see a ‘show’. Throughout much of the book, this seems to have no bearing on anything else. But this story is far too clever to leave no stone unturned. It all comes together, but you do need to concentrate!

Apart from the intricately woven plot, I love the writing. It’s very unique in its style, with lots of puns and banter (though not in an un-PC way like many detective novels). The best occur between Andy and fellow police officer Petrakis, and also between Andy and the pathologist (they are always weird and wonderful). I would also say with Devlin, but it’s more one-sided as Devlin is a bit of an annoying idiot, but these characters give colour to the whole thing. And of course the wonderful Doirin, my favourite by a mile.

Many thanks to @lovebookstours for inviting me to be part of #OneNightOnly blog tour.

About the Author

G.P. Ritchie enjoyed a misspent childhood hanging around shady libraries and falling into the company of the wrong sorts of books and comics. He gained a life-long ambition to write… but ended up working in software development instead. He blogs at nightsborder-dot-com, but rather unwisely, has never spent time as a cryptozoologist, ninja, or any of that other exciting stuff sensible authors do before writing one of these descriptions.

His tastes in fiction skew towards the creepy: crime, horror, dark fantasy, with all of these represented in his work. Prior to publishing fiction in book form, he crowbarred some material onto radio and stage.

He lives in Edinburgh with his wife and son.