Life on Mars: Borstal Slags

Life on Mars #3

by Tom Graham

Time to leap into the Cortina as Sam Tyler and Gene Hunt roar back into action in a brand new installment of Life on Mars. 'Smell that borstal whiff, Tyler. The heady aroma of body odour, spunk, and bunged up khazis. And that's just the staff who work here.' It's time to get tooled up as DI Sam Tyler and DCI Gene Hunt find themselves pursuing justice on the wrong side of the prison walls in this third exciting instalment of Life on Mars. A grisly death, a mysterious letter, and a runaway truck on the rampage - what is it that connects them, and why does it point towards the brutal regime at Friar's Brook borstal? Is Head Warder McClintock taking his obsession with control and punishment to murderous extremes? Or are there even darker forces at work amid the young criminal minds incarcerated behind those high walls? For Sam, Friar's Brook will be far more than just a police investigation. What he encounters there will tear his world apart.

Genres: Mystery

344 pages, Paperback

First published March 14, 2013

About the author

Multiple authors with the same name, this author is entered with 1 space.

Tom Graham left school at 14 without qualifications. He is a smoker, and says that writing the Life on Mars novels is the nearest thing he's had to a regular job since he got banned from driving. He part-owns a greyhound called Arthur and his ambition is to get fruity with Raquel Welch (to be clear about it, that's Tom's ambition, not Arthur's).

Reviews

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

The best out of the 3 books so far.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Woah what happened Tom Graham? This installment is the real deal. The voices are perfect, the team all join in, Annie is finally written the way she was played by Liz in the show and the double mystery of the week format returns with Sam's attempts to solve a 73 murder complicated by glimpses of someone else's past. I dock a star for the over use of people 'intoning' their words and because there is still an uncomfortable level of Gene sexism towards Annie that was never in the show. Otherwise, I couldn't put this one down. Bonus star for Sam's epic borstal slags speech and for extra lashings of cryptic Nelson.

[February · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Better than the first two books in my opinion. The characters voices were closer to the television show. Still, some of the scenes were a bit drawn out with clunky dialogue. Overall, an enjoyable read and looking forward to the finale.

[daft sod · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 best yet he cooked a little

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5-4 stars. An enjoyable read but getting way too bogged down in myth and meaning. I was glad to see a lot more Annie in this book, as she's been missing in the previous ones. By now it's also pretty obvious what the purpose of these books are.

[Doug · Rating 3 out of 5]

And we hit the third of the series of four Life on Mars novels. The events of this book finally catch up to the blatant foreshadowing of book one, so now I finally feel like I am where I'm supposed to be. The Major Subplot advances a lot in this book, but is clearly a big setup for the events of book 4. All is spelled out. We are solidly placed in the Ashes to Ashes universe here, and there is a nice conversation with Nelson the Barman where things that were implicit are now made explicit. And Ray makes an offhand comment that, if you've seen Ashes to Ashes, becomes really sad. Gene is starting to put some pieces together as well.

The other plot, the Main Plot, about Borstal and Slags? It was pretty good. It felt like an episode of Life on Mars. Of the three books in the series I've read so far, this one's main plot was the most gripping. There's a legit mystery here, and it gets resolved. And the climax has some pretty suspenseful and scary moments.

The two plots fit together very nicely as well, the least awkward melding of the three I've read. Tom Graham has gotten better at writing these books; I feel a little bad there is only one more to go. I could read several more. But given that he is adding on to a show that had a unambiguously definitive ending, and there was a sequel show that pretty much spelled out what happened after, it is quite a feat he found four books worth of more to say. I haven't started the fourth book yet, but I am guessing there REALLY will be no more to say after that one!

Anyway - I'm glad I read it. If you are a Life on Mars fan, you will probably find it worth your time, too.

[Tracy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it. By far the best out of the 3 so far. So many little things reference Ashes, which is a great. Gene is his usual lovable gobby self with fantastic Geneisms. Really enjoyed the sneak peek first chapter of Get Cartwright, just wish it was summer already so I could read it.

[Chelsea Cahill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely my favorite of the three in the quartet I've read so far. The case and the in depth look into Annie's past and the make-up of Gene's world were all very well done, and I'm looking forward to reading the final installment now :)

[Cathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book much more than the first two. Looking forward to the conclusion in the next.