A Little White Death (The Inspector Troy Novels, 4) - Hardcover

Lawton, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0871139324 ISBN 13: 9780871139320

Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2006

Synopsis

The latest novel from the master spy novelist John Lawton follows Inspector Troy, now Scotland Yard’s chief detective, deep into a scandal reminiscent of the infamous Profumo affair. England in 1963 is a country set to explode. The old guard, shocked by the habits of the war baby youth — sex, drugs, and rock and roll — sets out to fight back. The battle moves uncomfortably close to Chief Inspector Troy. While Troy is on medical leave for a nasty case of tuberculosis, the Yard brings charges against an acquaintance of his, a hedonistic doctor with a penchant for voyeurism and uninhibited young women. Two of these women just happen to be sleeping with a senior man at the Foreign Office and a KGB agent. But on the eve of the verdict a curious double case of suicide drags Troy back into active duty. Beyond bedroom acrobatics, the secret affairs now stretch to double-crosses and backroom deals in the halls of Parliament, not to mention murder. It’s all Troy can do, fighting off some bad habits of his own, to stay afloat in a country immersed in drugs and up to its neck in scandal.

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Reviews

London in the swinging '60s provides the setting for this latest in Lawton's series featuring Scotland Yard lawman Frederick Troy. Troy finds himself a reluctant attendee at several country weekends where a flashy acquaintance, Dr. Patrick Fitzpatrick, holds sybaritic court. The aristocratic Troy has been, equally reluctantly, attempting to acclimate himself to the wide-open atmosphere of the new England, a country in the grip of a seismic social and sexual upheaval. Fitz and several government cronies have been shagging a pair of beautiful twins, the Ffitch sisters, and the equally lovely but underage Clover Browne. When Fitz is arrested for "immoral earnings and procurement," Troy escapes the media spotlight, confined to a sanatorium with a nasty case of tuberculosis. Troy rallies to investigate after several participants in the Fitz scandal are found dead. The whodunit phase takes several hundred pages to ignite, but Lawton is such an entertaining, literate storyteller it doesn't really matter. Once the now frail Troy steps in, neither threats, beatings, near-drowning nor shooting can frighten him off the case. New readers who fall under the considerable spell of the indefatigable Troy can seek out earlier adventures, Black Out, Old Flames, Riptide, Flesh Wounds and Bluffing Mr. Churchill.
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Originally published in 1998 but now appearing for the first time in the U.S., Lawton's follow-up to Black Out (1995) and Old Flames (2002) weaves the Profumo Affair and the Kim Philby spy scandal into a stylish novel of intrigue and manners spanning the corridors of power and the back alleys of vice, circa 1963. A brief foray into London nightlife, swinging-sixties style, sidelines Scotland Yard Inspector Troy with a wasting disease until the plight of a playboy doctor and a suspicious suicide pact drag Troy back into the game. While some details of British history may be lost on American readers, there are ample conspiracies and red herrings to satisfy fans of the erudite thrillers of Robert Wilson, Charles McCarry, and John le Carre. The pleasure of Lawton's ambling period piece resides at least as much in the detailed texture of life and society and in the urbane repartee (the aristocratic Troy even holds his own in a discussion with Dame Rebecca West on the illusory nature of sexual liberation) as it does in the complexities of a soundly sprung plot. Recommended for most libraries. David Wright
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Edition details

• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0871139324
• ISBN 13: 9780871139320
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 448