Minor Brookmyre, 1 Jun 2005

By	J. E. Davidson (UK) - See all my reviews

It is another outing for recurring character, journalist and cynic Jack Parlabane as he attends a team building weekend with a twist. This is not a true Parlabane novel, although he is a significant character this is more an ensemble piece with a host of new characters introduced. On one level this is a good thing, Parlabane was never my favourite Brookmyre character and I was starting to tire of him. However, this approach does entail introducing a lot of new characters very quickly - Brookmyre does this with mixed success - some of the cast quickly form into interesting characters but others never really rise above cliché. The other problem with the book is that one of the central themes, political attitudes changing with age, is not entirely successful.

Despite my issues with the book, I still really enjoyed it. It is an easy read and would make a good book to read on holiday.

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Not THAT bad, 14 Jul 2004

Vale is a marvellously wrought character with support from the familiar Parlabane. Here Brookmyre fleshes Vale out a little without exploding the enjoyable mystery of the gentleman-agent. The plot twists unexpectedly in places and there is the odd bit of evil ingenuity from vale and Parlabane. Brookmyre leads us by the hand a little at the start, recounting some of Parlanbane's previous adventures in a manner that has clearly irritated some of the other reviewers. I'd suspect this introductory material is at the behest of agent/publisher. Nevertheless, the book contains much originality and many of the supposed resemblances to "One Fine Day" are superficial or can be forgiven. I've re-read Be my Enemy once already and would argue the gems it contains clearly outweigh the disappointments. Hard to decide on whether this is a 4/5 or 3/5. I've gone with 3/5 because ultimately it doesn't rank with "One Fine Day" or "A Big Boy Did it" (to which it is most comparable).

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what the hell was that!, 18 Feb 2004

The first 200 or so pages are a loose collection of article-length passages better suited to publication on their own, rather than being loosely strung together to form the basis of the novel. Having ploughed through the first half of the book some semblence of plot arrived - although it was so stereotypical and studio-bound that I thought I had strayed into the next series of 24. And as for the 'silly' factor, I find it hard to believe that a writer of Brookmyre's undoubted ability actually sat there and just kept going as things went from silly to absurd - and out the other side!

While I am on a Brookmyreian rant - what was going on with the proof-reading - dike, Arran, poe-faced, etc. Don't we have any standards any more! In the end this lack of care annoyed my partner so much that she gave up the book as a bad idea.

This book read like a camel looks - a thoroughbred designed by committee trying to get all the good ideas they can think of in there somewhere.

I look forward to something much, much better from a writer with such a proved track record.

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