About this deal
Well—the Newark boys have a little celebration going. They give me a couple of shots every time I touch down there. How long do we keep this up? Marrow had placed a chair in the protective shadow of the filing cabinet. The other man in the room continued to pace the floor. Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2010-11-11 17:17:21 Bookplateleaf 0002 Boxid IA121006 Camera Canon 5D City New York Donor You guys camping out somewhere? he demanded. I want someone on that phone. All the time. Everything ready?
He hung up. Newark is ready, anyway, he said, his eyes on his watch. Meyers will be stepping through—just—about—now. All of which proved nothing except that looks could be extremely misleading, and no one knew that better than private detective Jan Darzek. Arnold returned to the office. Marrow seemed to have got a grip on himself. He had moved his chair over by the table, and Arnold considered finding something for him to do and decided there wasn’t anything that needed doing. Watkins had resumed his floor pacing. Arnold sat down, got the Newark station on one telephone and Perrin on another, and waited, wondering if he had been ridiculously optimistic in rating their chances at fifty-fifty. All the Colors of Darkness is another example of Robinson’s seamless, insightful storytelling.” Sun Sentinel; read full review Arnold went to the table, lowered himself cautiously onto a folding chair—at least two of those in the room had been known to collapse upon slight provocation—and reached for a telephone.Where it doesnt is a frankly strange interlude with Banks at the heart of a terrorist bomb. I would love to know why this is here - is it to show that M15 are required because of the threat of international terrorism? On its own, it adds nothing at all to the story. Arnold nodded again. Universal Trans is opening next Monday. But a month ago no one knew that. I didn’t know it myself, and if I didn’t know it no one did. A month ago I wouldn’t have given you five hundred cents for your hundred shares. When Darzek exits a teleport gate at the other end, he finds himself in a low-gravity setting - and in a room with thin, wide, 8-foot-tall aliens. They want to be kept a secret and don't intend to let him leave. He destroys some of their equipment in an adjacent room - which causes a large explosion. He wakes up bandaged up all over. Initially, they won't tell him much because of their code of honor. Over time, he convinces them that their rules justify telling him more. He learns that the explosion has left them with a limited air supply and unable to send requests for more, so they have accepted that to keep to their code they must simply wait until the air runs out and die. He also learns that they are there to prevent humans from traveling to other planets because humans are "dark." Darzek eventually convinces some of them to try a plan that may save them. Without giving anything more away, let me just say that the conclusion involves two of the characters being chased by two others. The characters being pursued are in a Porsche; they have a head start, and the driver is very familiar with the road. The pursuers are in a BMW; they are behind from the git-go, and the driver cannot know the road as well as the Porsche driver. Still, the BMW somehow manages to overtake the Porsche and force it off the road. In the Real World, this simply isn't going to happen, unless the Porsche owner is the most inept driver on the planet.
It's always fun to accompany Banks and Cabbot on an investigation because they are fully-realized characters. Robinson gives a lot of interesting details (his pub scenes are always absorbing) and a fine sense of place, especially London in this book. Banks is witness to a horrific terrorist bombing in Oxford Circus. Lccn 2008019015 Ocr ABBYY FineReader 8.0 Ocr_converted abbyy-to-hocr 1.1.20 Ocr_module_version 0.0.16 Openlibrary_edition Perrin glanced at his board, and threw a switch. Nothing happened for so long that Arnold became uneasy, and then Meyers reappeared. When the body of a man is discovered hanging from a tree in the woods near Eastvale, all signs point toward suicide. At least that's what it initially looks like to Detective Inspector Annie Cabbot. Just getting started, Arnold told him. That was an X-7-R that blew. The old model. The one in Baltimore blew, and Philadelphia—this should be Philadelphia.Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival. Of course, Nervochaos, being 25 years old and part of the oldest generation of the Brazilian extreme scene – together with Sepultura, Krisiun, Rebaelliun or Abhorrence, just to name a few – have the experience, the pedigree and the technical know-how to do it in spades. In a switch from the henning mankell novel recenyly read, we have a mystery here which is not resolved until the end. We follow banks as he progresses through the investigation. Watkins bounced out in front of them. His face was flushed, his white hair ruffled. He was waving a bottle of champagne. Arnold fumbled for a handkerchief, and as he mopped the perspiration from his bald head the pacing stopped a second time. A minute, you say?
I have only recently 'discovered' Peter Robinson and his wonderful Inspector Banks novels. They are well planned and realistic. I love the flow and his ability to keep you guessing right to the last chapter. All the Colors of Darkness' (1963) is the first of the Jan Darzen novels and is a little disappointing, not because it is 'bad' (it isn't by any means) but because the central idea is so interesting and initially well handled that reducing it to an off-planet 'mystery' tale flattens early expectations. Biggle sets up his series to be entertainments relying on the technology of matter transmission but one senses an opportunity lost and an under-use of his talents, a sudden loss of imagination as more than just complicated story lines and aliens.
Recommendations
Too many questions are left unanswered to suit Banks' "copper's curiosity," and soon the stubborn and diligent chief inspector embarks on a further investigation -- unofficial -- into the untimely deaths of the two gay lovers. One of the dead men was a retired MI6 agent; it isn't long that government agents make their dissatisfaction with Banks' curiosity known. Watkins smiled. I’ve gambled on worse odds than that, and won, he said wistfully. But right now—this thing— This is a somewhat confused crime tale as Banks investigates a hanging which seems to be part of a murder-suicide case. The murder aspect looks at a gay man found dead in his home. Some years ago he had travelled for the Foreign Office; no stretch of the imagination to see that his continued absences abroad meant he is still working as a spy. So I don't know why it took Banks so long to see it. The photos produced among evidence were obviously the sort taken by a private investigator; again, Banks doesn't realise until the business card falls into his lap. Much confusion in the ranks as the shadowy world of spies seems to have no relation to the real world.