Review by Booklist Review
Cartmel puts a devilishly clever spin on his Vinyl Detective series about a guy who hunts for rare LPs and expands his circle of London vintage fanatics by introducing Cordelia, whose ardor for valuable crime paperbacks induces her to take audacious risks. Young, smart, and tough, Cordelia has parlayed her hardcore drug-addiction into bibliomania, turning to weed and custom-made porn for kicks. It's her dealer, the seemingly prim Mrs. Chichester, who inadvertently sets Cordelia on the path to becoming the Paperback Sleuth as the perfect foil for selling stolen loot. This connection also brings Cordelia a bit closer to her crush, gorgeous Agatha, another crime-paperback fanatic who appeared in Cartmel's former series. Piercingly observant, acidly funny, and covertly vicious, Cordelia mocks her fuddy-duddy landlord, Edwin, until her epic hubris puts her life in danger and he reveals his true nature. Cartmel delights in rhapsodizing over the gorgeously "lurid" cover art of the most coveted vintage crime novels, name-dropping such real-life artists as James Bama, while tightly constructing a richly suspenseful plot fueled by shock and awe over Cordelia's crazy confidence. Readers will be primed for more.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Cartmel (the Vinyl Detective mysteries) has never been better than in this darkly funny series kickoff centered on London bookseller Cordelia Stanmer, a former addict who has fallen in love with vintage paperbacks and has no scruples about how she'll feed her growing collection. Cordelia often forges author signatures to jack up a book's resale value and offers bribes to church sale organizers for a first crack at rare volumes. While picking up weed at her dealer's house one afternoon, she glimpses a photo of a bookcase stuffed with rare crime novels and resolves to find out where the photo was taken, break in, and steal as many of the beautifully illustrated editions as she can. Her scheming hits an unexpected snag when she successfully makes away with the volumes--only to realize she's just robbed one of London's most notorious criminals, who sets out for revenge. Cordelia is a memorable, devilish antihero, and Cartmel's delightfully dexterous plotting bodes well for a sequel. Fans of Lynne Truss's Constable Twitten novels will find much to love. (June)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A voracious and felonious appetite for paperback books gets a resourceful young woman into all kinds of trouble. A brief prologue introduces Cordelia Stanmer with a dead man at her feet, a scene straight out of James M. Cain and the first of the many noir fiction references with which her story is packed. Just a few weeks earlier, she's indulging her passion for softcover books, which she can resell at an astronomical price after forging the author's name inside. Cordelia's not above indulging in burglary to feed her paperback habit. Edwin, her laid-back landlord, helps her stay afloat with the occasional loan and with weed. Cordelia's no-account elder brother, Stuart, also known as Stinky, pops in unannounced from time to time to complicate her life further. What she covets most are a series of vintage crime novels under the Sleuth Hound imprint. When Cordelia spots a collection of them in a photograph, she devises a daring and totally illegal plan to obtain them. But the biggest score of all is the cache of Sleuth Hound books she spots in a bag held by mild-mannered Colin Cutterham. Fortunately for her, the man is not only a voracious collector of Sleuth Hound titles, but also a creature of habit. Cordelia undertakes a serious surveillance mission in anticipation of a big score. What could possibly go wrong? Cartmel brings the same insouciance and offbeat charm to this series kickoff as to his long-running Vinyl Detective series. A quirky crime yarn bound to hit the sweet spot for mystery lovers. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
