I first met Chris McDonald (very briefly) at Stockport Noir last year. As one of the organisers of the event, he’s been very active in promoting crime fiction , and gains massive brownie points for that alone. Since then, I’ve met him a few more times and found him to be (as others have confirmed) just the loveliest man. That said, it’s remarkable how often you can say that about crime writers.
Anyway, I’d heard a few things about The Wrong Man some time last year. It wasn’t due out until this summer but already word was beginning to get around. And that’s always a good sign, isn’t it?
One of the things I’d heard was that The Wrong Man was about the world of rock music. With a passion for that music and an interest in that world, I’d have been interested anyway. But having put a rock star in my first Rand Scott novel, Borderline, there was an added incentive: would Chris’s book be similar to mine?
As it turned out, the similarities pretty much started and ended there.
It wouldn’t be appropriate to put comparisons and differences in here. For a start: spoilers! But also, these are two very different books in many respects. And, while I have a bias towards my own writing (because I’m big-headed like that), The Wrong Man is an absolute belter of a book. Set in Manchester, we have a protagonist who’s a PI with a difference.
The Manchester connection is good, because it’s a further development of the trend to set books outside of the capital and, more importantly, in the north of England. That north/south divide still needs fixing, but writing books set in the north helps. The PI with a difference is Ethan Adler, whose wife died hours after he won the lottery. So he has money to burn, suspicion hanging over him, and a desire to move on with his life. These points aren’t spoilers because they’re pretty much covered in the blurb. But it does present an interesting dynamic, as well as a set up that can continue beyond the one book. And, judging by the way The Wrong Man ended, it will do.
Incidentally, I don’t know Manchester particularly well, but it certainly came to life on the page. Some people talk about settings being like characters in a book. I didn’t feel that here, but the city certainly felt very present. And, frankly, I wouldn’t have wanted it to take on a more dominant role. The real characters needed to do that – and did it very well. I don’t recall lots of descriptions of them, but I saw them pretty clearly in my mind. Then again, it’s very often their characteristics that make the difference, rather than what they looked like, and I felt connected to all of them, good and bad. And I certainly want to read more of Ethan – and Amelia, who was a delight to meet. I’ll say no more about her here, other than that she is worth the price of the book on her own.
The mystery they investigate hooks you in from the outset. The inevitable blind alleys and setbacks work well and, when there’s action, it grabs you where it should.
If you enjoy crime fiction, if you enjoy PI fiction, if you like a mystery, and you like to get down to where the grit and grubbiness is in the worlds of crime and the music industry, this book is a treat. I can’t speak highly enough of it.
If I have piqued your interest and you want to know more, click on the image below
