- Paperback: 224 pages
- Publisher: HarperCollins; New edition edition (2 Oct 2000)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0006513611
- ISBN-13: 978-0006513612
- Product Dimensions: 17.2 x 10.8 x 1.6 cm
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,222,818 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Review
‘Gwendoline Butler is excellent on the bizarre fantasies of other people’s lives and on modern paranoia overlaying old secrets; and her plots have the rare ability to shock’
Andrew Taylor, Independent
‘Butler distils her own brand of disquiet: omnipresent and irresistible’
Sunday Times
‘Gwendoline Butler writes detective novels that both in method and atmosphere are things apart… she achieves that real whodunit pull’
The Times
Product Description
‘[Gwendoline Butler’s] inventiveness never seems to flag; and the singular atmosphere of her books, compounded of jauntiness and menace, remains undiminished’ Patricia Craig, TLS
Everyone has a few ghost in their lives, especially John Coffin, Chief Commander of the Second City of London’s Police. He had thought all his were laid to rest though, and, newly recovered from a gunshot wound, is hoping for a calmer life with his actress wife Stella Pinero.
But he is soon to learn how wrong he is when a parcel containing dismembered limbs is found outside a women’s refuge. The Serena Seddon Shelter for battered wives is located in Barrow Street, not far from Coffin’s own home in St Luke’s Tower. The link to Coffin, though, is more sinister than mere proximity, for the initials J.C. are written on the package, and the shelter is housed in the building where he lived on his arrival in the Second City.
The discovery opens a door, through which troop a succession of horrible and violent events: lies, deception and sudden death.
Thus Coffin’s ghost walks…
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Customer Reviews
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2 reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Very English but unsympathetic
18 Jan 2002
Format:Hardcover
Newly out of the hospital, commander John Coffin of London's mythical Second City police is confronted with a woman's severed arms and legs outside his former home. His thoughts turn to long abandoned affair--could the limbs belong to the woman? When a second women is murdered, Coffin begins to suspect his wife's friends. Yet with all of the police force at his disposal, no one seems to be able to find a real clue, or discover any reason why these attacks are happening now.
Author Gwendoline Butler does a fine job setting the scene in the 'second city' of London--a city of abandoned warehouses, crime, and poverty, with just the beginning of gentrification brought on by the theater. American readers may find Butler's Englishisms occasionally difficult to follow (although occasionally amusing--I especially enjoyed the police secretary with the pot plant (perhaps potted plant) on her desk).
With multiple murders, a dismembered woman and a decapitated cat, COFFIN'S GHOST should have been a fast-moving adventure. Instead, Butler's writing moves at a ponderous pace, leaving the reader both confused about where the plot is going and lethargic to find out. Coffin's regret over his affair seems more based on his fear of his wife's reaction to it than any realization that he made a mistake, and his treatment of the abandoned mistress is difficult to view sympathetically.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
I Thought Wrong...
9 Jan 2002
Format:Hardcover
"Coffin's Ghost" is supposed to be a mystery/thriller novel, but unfortunately, there is neither in this book. I was so excited to read this book and it took forever for me to find a place to order it from. I recieved the book and was utterly disappointed. There is no mystery or suspense in this novel whatsoever. This book came from England and it is extremely hard to follow, the book skips around like a rabbit in a field. You never know why something happens and you are always left hanging there. The characters are introduced randomly and they are speaking in "short-hand" making it hard to follow and understand. After reading this book I still have no idea what it was about. This novel has no plot or theme. Not reccommended.
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