DCI Banks helps the chief constable to track down his teenaged daughter, but a couple of months later her violent death occurs at about the same time as the killing of a local small-time criminal. At first the two deaths seem separate, but soon enough potential connections start emerging. ( )

After a reorganization, Annie Cabbot is now assigned to work out of Eastvale with DCI Banks. It is no secret that Chief Constable Jimmy Riddle dislikes Banks, so when Banks is summoned to the man's home, he is surprised. Riddle wants Banks to track down his missing daughter in an unofficial capacity. Banks locates the girl hanging with the wrong crowd in London, but things take some interesting turns from there. I'll leave it at that so I don't spoil the plot for anyone. Shortly after Banks returns, a night watchman with a criminal past ends up dead. Banks sends Cabot to do the initial interviews but with other things happening of more importance, he ends up passing that one off to DS Hatchley. Banks calls on his old friend "Dirty Dick" Burgess to help with some aspects of the major crime. I thought a few things might be left unresolved to come back in a future episode, but they ended up being resolved at the very end. I enjoyed this one, and I can't wait to see who the new chief constable will be. I listened to the audiobook. ( )

Jag blir aldrig besviken på Peter Robinson. Härligt lugnt brittiskt tempo. Välskrivet och nästan alltid bra intriger. Helt klart en av de bättre brittiska deckarförfattarna. ( )

“... he realized with a shock that the loss of innocence never stopped happening, that he was still losing it, that it was like a wound that never healed, and he would probably go on losing it, drop by drop, until the day he died.” — Peter Robinson, “Cold Is the Grave”

That Peter Robinson closes “Cold Is the Grave” (2000) with the words above tells us something not just about this particular novel but about his entire series of Inspector Banks novels: This is serious stuff. This is quality stuff. Here is a fictional detective hero who actually feels something about his cases, about the victims and the families of the victims and even about the villains whose actions cause so much suffering. So many fictional crime solvers seem to forget one case when they start another. Banks remembers, and so innocence drips out of him like blood from a wound.
Chief Constable Jimmy Riddle doesn't like Banks, but when his 16-year-old daughter runs away to London and subsequently appears on a porn site, he asks Banks to bring her back, but in an unofficial capacity rather than as a police officer. Riddle may not like Banks, but he knows he can do the job.

Banks does find Emily Riddle — in the company of a suspected mobster — and takes her home. Days later Emily dies in a pub after taking cocaine laced with poison. Banks takes her death hard, both because he thought he had just rescued her from danger but also because she is close in age to his own daughter.

Meanwhile, told by his wife that she wants a divorce, he reignites his affair with Annie Cabot, the officer who serves under him in this always-interesting series of crime novels, yet Annie wrestles with her own demons when a cop who had once participated in a gang rape of her shows up to assist in another case.

This novel may be longer than most of those in the series, but it never slows down and never seems too long. ( )

I thoroughly enjoyed my return to DCI Banks. I think that the series is just too big to be satisfied by a sprint through the entire oeuvre.

Banks has his personal issues but, they are kept in their proper place: subservient to the plot.

What I particularly admire about Mr Robinson's books is that they have the expected plot twist but, it never appears contrived. In this particular tale, it seems to be immediately apparent who committed the crimes and that all that is needed is the proof. As the investigation continues, however, inconvenient facts start to emerge which leads to a vault face in the last few pages.

Once the details of the real criminal are exposed, the reader has to admit that, not only does the new solution make perfect sense, but that the clues were there to be found.

An excellent book. ( )