The Killing Pool - Hardcover

Sampson, Kevin

3.36

108 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0224073052 ISBN 13: 9780224073059

Publisher: Jonathan Cape, 2013

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Detective Chief Inspector Billy McCartney discovers a headless corpse in the scrubland close to Liverpool docks. The slaying carries all the hallmarks of a gangland hit -- a message from the underworld to snitches, cops and rival gangs. One mile away, a Liverpool-Somali girl, Misha, staggers into a run-down bar, dazed and confused. The bar's owner, a career criminal called Shakespeare who dresses like an Edwardian dandy, cannot get a word out of her. Shakespeare, a chivalrous old Trinidadian who has called Liverpool his home since the 70s, is smitten.

DCI McCartney is all too well aware that the clock is ticking. The butchered body was one Kalan Rozaki, youngest brother of a notorious Liverpool-Kurdish crime family -- except Kalan is no criminal. For almost a year his brothers have been under full-time Drug Squad surveillance as McCartney slowly closed the net on the Rozakis' intercontinental heroin trafficking organisation. McCartney's key witness and chief informant on the case is someone with intimate insider knowledge of the Rozaki clan's operation... their newly deceased baby brother, Kalan.

McCartney's investigation into Kalan's murder peels back layer after layer of a decades-long dynasty of drug smuggling. Each revelation plunges Mac further back into the dark heart of an unsolved drug crime that weighs heavy on his soul. He wants to catch the Rozakis -- badly -- but he wants the shadowy men behind their drug empire even more. The closer McCartney gets to Kalan's killer, the closer he comes to facing down a lifetime's torment -- and facing up to the possibility, finally, of closure.

There is one solid gold witness to the killing, Kalan's girlfriend, Misha -- but Misha has vanished. Meanwhile a shipload of unadulterated heroin is sailing ever closer to the Port of Liverpool and Mac's key informant is dead. As dawn breaks on his day of destiny, Mac's priorities have become fatally intertwined: find Kalan's killer, rescue Misha and swoop on the Rozakis -- hopefully elbows-deep in heroin. Then, and only then, can he unmask the demon who has haunted his adult life.

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About the Author:

KEVIN SAMPSON is the author of seven novels -- Awaydays, Powder, Leisure, Outlaws, Clubland, Freshers and Stars are Stars -- and a work of non-fiction, Extra Time. He lives and works in Liverpool.

Review:

"Kevin Sampson's astringent novels takes us to mean streets of Liverpool; his language has all the demented idiosyncrasy of Elmore Leonard, with the interlacing of cut-throat humour barely undercutting the omnipresent menace. Things have changed since Raymond Chandler's day -- now British crime writers are quite as tough as the Yanks." -- Barry Forshaw Independent "This is tough and uncompromising stuff which may not be one for the faint hearted, but if you like your crime fiction with killer twists and shout aloud reveals, then The Killing Pool is just the book for you. DeathBecomesHer chose this without hesitation as her crime novel of the year 2013." CrimeFictionLover "Atmospheric thriller... Sampson is adept at keeping [the character's] voices distinct throughout a pacy novel, with its complicated plot that is tense from beginning to end." Liverpool Post "The final few paragraphs are as magnificent as they are unexpected. You will put this book down with a sense of dizzy wonder" -- Sachin Nakrani "A ferociously compelling slice of Scouse Noir." -- James Walton Reader's Digest

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