Storm - Softcover

Boris Starling

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006512054 ISBN 13: 9780006512059

Publisher: Harper Collins Publishers, 2000

Synopsis

Elemental rage, bloody Greek myth, man's greed and capacity for cruelty, the insane imaginings of a killer, all intermingle in this stunning new thriller from the bestselling author of Messiah to create a novel of stunning ferocity. A storm-tossed crossing on the North Sea; a catastrophic ferry accident; hundreds dead. Detective Chief Inspector Kate Beauchamp is one of the survivors but her ferocious fight to stay alive brings with it a high cost: a burden of guilt that she should live while some of her friends died; a terror of water; a frozen inner core that never seems to melt. When the body of a young female journalist is found in Aberdeen soon after the disaster, Kate insists on conducting the investigation -- partly to exorcize her own demons, partly because she feels a strange affinity with the victim. The killing is peculiarly brutal and the murderer has left a unique calling card: attached to the woman's neck is a poisonous snake. Into this emotional cauldron steps the last man on earth Kate wants to see -- her estranged father, Frank, in Aberdeen to conduct the marine inquiry into the sinking. Was the disaster the result of a bomb, as claimed by the ferry-line's chairman, or is he trying to hide something? In a sweltering heatwave, Kate and Frank conduct their highly pressured investigations. But for both of them, danger is approaching fast -- a vortex of violence which will sweep them up and endanger their very lives.

About this title

About the Author:

Boris Starling graduated with a First from Cambridge and went on to an illustrious career with Control Risk organization before turning to writing full-time. An avid triathelete, Boris was the youngest ever participant to reach the semi-finals of Mastermind with his special topics of Tintin and the novels of Dick Francis. He lives in London.

From Publishers Weekly:

Delving deeper into the mind of a serial killer than he did in his first novel, Messiah, Starling takes readers to the brink of madness with a character who is unrelentingly violent (he tortures his victims prior to killing them by forcing rats to gnaw through their stomachs) yet literate (his victims are chosen based on characters from Aeschylus's complex Greek myth, the Oresteia). The book's unlikely beginnings stem from a suspicious passenger-ferry sinking off the coast of Scotland. Among the survivors is Kate Beauchamp, a chief detective on Scotland's Grampian police force and a member of the Aberdeen Amateur Acting Company, with whom she's traveling. Upon returning to work, Kate is immediately confronted with the grisly murder and dismemberment of pretty Petra Gallacher. Two days later, elderly busybody Elizabeth Hart dies a similar death, and Kate vows to stop at nothing until the dangerous killerDnicknamed Blackadder, after the snake he leaves on each of his victim's bodiesDis apprehended. Starling expertly renders a strong heroine who uncovers no fewer than a half-dozen suspects who were either travelers on the doomed ferry or are somehow connected with its investigation, and he skillfully builds the suspense as he joins various plot lines to the main story and slowly reveals the killer's identity. (Nov. 7)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Collins Publishers
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0006512054
• ISBN 13: 9780006512059
• Binding: Paperback