He Died with His Eyes Open (Melville International Crime) [Paperback]

"'A crackerjack of a crime novel, unafraid to face the reality of man's and woman's evil' Evening Standard 'A unique crime writer whose fictional world was brutal, realistic and harrowing in the extreme' Maxim Jakubowski, Guardian 'Peopled by a fast-talking shower of queens, spades, morries, slags, shysters, grifters and grafters of every description, The Crust on its Uppers is one of the great London novels' New Statesman 'A State of Denmark is a fascinating and important novel by one of our best writers in or outside of any genre' Time Out" --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

As it turns out, a dead man can tell stories...

Murders are a dime a dozen in Margaret Thatcher's London, and when it comes to the brutal killing of a middle-aged alcoholic found dumped outside of town, Scotland Yard has more important cases to deal with.

Instead it's a job for the Department of Unexplained Deaths and its head Detective Sergeant. With only a box of cassette-tape diaries as evidence the rogue detective has no chouce but to listen to the haunting voice of the victim for clues to his gruesome end.

The first book in Derek Raymond's acclaimed Factory Series is an unflinching yet deeply compassionate portrait of a city plagued by poverty and perversion, and a policeman who may be the only one who cares about the "people who don't matter and who never did."

Derek Raymond was born Robin Cook in 1931. His novels include A State of Denmark, The Crust on its Uppers, I Was Dora Suarez and How the Dead Live, which was made into a film. The son of a textile magnate, he dropped out of Eton aged sixteen and spent much of his early career among criminals and was employed at various times as a pornographer, organiser of illegal gambling, money launderer, pig-slaughterer and minicab driver. He died in London in 1994. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.