Read this after picking it up in a little free library. Had to go back and read the first in the series (which was excellent) and then thoroughly enjoyed this one as well. If you've ever been on the receiving end of crime this might make for uncomfortable reading as there are moments when the reader can feel slightly sympathetic towards the protagonists despite their horrendous behaviour. Don't worry that feeling soon wears off as the action moves from murder to spree killing and a very surprising conclusion that blows away the slight feeling of predictability that the end of the book made me feel. Certainly an author who is not afraid to shock his readers. ( )

The Dying Place – Brilliant

Unlike muscians who struggle with their second album Luca Veste with his follow up to the debut outing in Dead Gone has scored a winning goal with The Dying Place. There are no Stevie Gerrard slips ups here for us Mancunians to take the mickey out of him. This is a brilliant return for Detective Inspector David Murphy and his side kick Detective Sergant Laura Rossi.

One again Luce Veste has written a crime thriller with the emphasis on thriller wonderfully dark and intense with a nod to crime sprees that have happened around the North West. Veste delves in to the depths of the criminal psyche and gives us something that is original, shocking, at times terrifying but not forgetting wonderfully twisted.

At the outset one could sympathise with the criminals at first, doing the work that the police cannot really do to the local estate scallies other than hand out ASBOs. Every town and city has the identikit scally, tracksuit bottoms, hoodie, trainers, smoking weed and drinking cheap cider, even though the dress could be called standard for a scouser!

DI Murphy has been back at work for a while since being on the sick since the ending in Dead Gone and his CID team have had very little to do in the way of work. Which when covering the northern areas of Liverpool, including West Derby and Norris Green both great places in their day going down hill due to lack of investment and in some instances lack of care. The death of one of the local scallies with his body dumped on the doorstep of a church is not as straightforward as it may seem. As they investigate the death of Goldie they find he has been missing for several months and over that time his body is showing the effects of abuse, which give them a number of lines of enquiry but seemingly nowhere to go.

As they investigate they are led to a farm where there are a number of dead bodies all over the place which really is a honey hole of death and destruction. It dawns on the police that a number of male youths known to the police have been taken from the streets and something unspeakable has happened to them.

The big question is will Murphy and Rossi be able to find the people responsible for what has been going on and whether they will be able to stop them. They need to figure out what they end game could possibly be as the bodies start to pile up dead and injured. Murphy has to move quickly even if he does not know that things will be a lot closer to home than he already knows. Ending with a couple of twists Murphy and Rossi come out on top but this will come at a cost to them both.

The Dying Place is a brilliant follow up to Dead Gone really hits the thriller button as you turn the pages urging Murphy and Rossi on. The only thing that would finish this Scouse Noir Thriller off is for a Mancunian Manchester United fan (rarer than rocking horse shit) to be the baddie! This really is an excellent example of the new Scouse Noir Thriller that grabs you by the throat holds you tight all the way to the end and leaves you at the end gasping for breath. Luca Veste has so much talent with plenty more to come, cannot wait just hope he allows me to recover first!