Dry Bones That Dream

Author: – Peter Robinson

Buy This Book From Amazon

Synopsis Of – ‘Dry Bones That Dream’ – Taken From The Book

One May evening, two masked men tie up Alison Rothwell and her mother, take Keith Rothwell to the garage of his isolated Yorkshire Dales farmhouse, and blow his head off with a shotgun. Why? This is the question Chief Inspector Alan Banks has to ask as he sifts through Rothwell’s past.

The more Banks scratches the surface the more he wonders what lies beneath the veneer of this apparently happy family.

Only after Banks pits his job against his sense of justice does he discover the truth. And the truth leads him to one of the most difficult decisions of his career…..

Brief Author Biography:

Born in Yorkshire, Peter Robinson achieved his BA Honours Degree in English Literature at Leeds University, went to Canada to take his MA in English and Creative Writing, returning to York University where he was awarded a PhD in English.

He now divides his time between, Richmond North Yorkshire UK and Toronto Canada.

He is renowned for introducing us to the character, Detective Inspector Alan Banks, in his first novel ‘Gallows View’, in 1987. This Mystery Series, now boasts some 19 books, plus numerous nominations and awards, for it’s author.

My Review Of: – ‘Dry Bones That Dream’

Like many other people I have spoken to, I have not started the series of Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks mysteries at the start, but mid way through, in my case, with his seventh mystery.

By now, the author has developed his Banks character more fully, but far from feeling cheated that I wasn’t in on it right from the beginning, Banks and his team have the ability to draw you into the plot, so that I feel quite comfortable in assessing each book, as a snapshot, in it’s own right and not looking to the series as a whole.

His character by now seems well defined and very unlike two of my other favourite detectives – he is not muddled and sloppy, like Frost – nor picky and pedantic, like Morse.

Banks appears very methodical and thorough in his questioning techniques, in a crowd he wouldn’t stand out as a policeman, and ‘the end justifies the means’, does not seem to be an ethos he readily adopts. He works with a small team of people, whom he seems to trust, and who appear to trust him. There is also mutual respect between him and his Superintendent, who wants to be involved every step of the way, during the investigation.

Like us all though, he isn’t perfect …. page 214 “Though he was eager to learn, read, look and listen as much as his time allowed, Banks was always aware of his working-class background and his lack of  a true formal education.”

An expatriate Londoner, now living and working in Swainsdale, I would say he has never quite shaken that London dust off his shoes and still finds himself caught in limbo at times….. page 62 “Banks had never tried too hard to fit in, to pretend he was one of the crowdlike some of the other incomers”

Like a lot of Detectives, he increasingly finding himself in a marriage that isn’t working ….. page 86 “It was getting to be par for the course. They had seen so little of one another lately that they were fast becoming strangers.”

Also, at one point during the investigation, he shows that he isn’t afraid to break the rules when necessary, when he gets into a fight, where the perpetrators definitely come off worst and Banks walks away, without a backward glance.

He also rebels a little when some of his ex-London colleagues show up to stake their claim for the  Fraud Office, during part of the investigation. Banks is determined that his murder case is not going to be swept aside and a tyrant allowed free passage, as a trade off for them sewing up the fraud aspect of  the case nice and neatly, whilst allowing his murderers to walk free.

The seemingly grief stricken family of the murdered man, are not quite all they seem. There are secrets to be uncovered among this group, who have an almost Victorian outlook on life. Ex colleagues of Keith Rothwell hint at many more secrets and subterfuges to be uncovered, together with a double life being led out in the open, but undiscovered fully by Banks, until the very last page.

The plot has been cleverly written, with many many layers and red herrings being laid, but Peter Robinson has given Alan Banks intuitiveness to see through them all, without revealing them to the reader prematurely.

A fantastic read, well worth it’s 5 stars in my personal review rating.