The Last Straw - Ed Duncan

A slick, clever, crime novel, which follows two rival hitmen, past lovers, gangland violence and settling of scores. 

I like to keep my synopses on this blog short - I try to give you the idea of the story and the feel of the plot but without going into too much detail and giving the game away. I'll try to keep this one brief, but I don't know if I can give you the gist of it quickly. 

The trouble all starts with a carjacking that ends in a murder. It's witnessed by a teenage girl, who is the daughter of a friend of a lawyer, Paul, who I understand is one of the main characters in the first book. An attempt is made to take her life, but it goes badly wrong. It becomes clear the boss of a criminal organisation has ordered her to be killed, but his motive is yet unknown to the girl and Paul. The hitman who failed, D'Angelo, was the boss's second choice, after his first choice of hitmen, Rico turned the job down - he has a moral opposition to hurting women. This fuels the bad blood between Rico and D'Angelo, which has carried on from the first book, and leads to a violent game of chess between the two killers. It may come across as slightly convoluted and complex, but the story really isn't too hard to keep up with, which is no bad thing. The main draw of this novel is the plot, and it doesn't disappoint.

The Last Straw is the second in the Pigeon Blood Red series by Ed Duncan, and I have to admit I've committed a bookish sin with this one - I jumped into the second book without reading the first. I didn't know what to expect or if I would be lost completely, having little idea of the backstory to this book. I've read a few series before where it is essential to read all the books in order and have a photographic memory of them all, and have every tiny detail burned into your mind. Happily, this isn't the case here. Ed has pulled off that rare feat of writing a second book, which can stand on its own two feet and be read independently of the others, but also moves the story along, leaving room for the next instalment. It touches on the first, but subtly retells the relevant plot points, meaning the reader is clued up on who is who; who has a rivalry with who; who killed who and all of the history in the complicated cast of characters here.

There seems to be a big cast in this one, but they are dropped in well, and with great timing. Each character joins in the story right on cue -  it feels natural and in a way that make the reader feel like they know them personally, so when one doesn't appear for 30 pages it isn't a case of flicking back to remind yourself who they are and what they are up to. This makes the book extremely readable, and it flows like a dream.

A nice little touch was the various literary reference throughout the book. Duncan drops in John Donne, Kafka and few others, just a a few Easter eggs here and there. On the whole, the writing and prose is really stylised - this is a gritty crime novel and the narration fits that perfectly.

I'd recommend this to crime fans, especially any who are looking for that new series to get into. I'll be checking out the first one, and keep an eye or when number 3 is on the shelves.