cover image The Last King of Brighton: The Second Brighton Mystery

The Last King of Brighton: The Second Brighton Mystery

Peter Guttridge. Severn, $29.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-7278-8009-3

Guttridge's second Brighton mystery falls short of the standard set by its predecessor, City of Dreadful Night (2010), but admirers of the first book still won't want to miss the trilogy's conclusion. After a gory prologue set in the present that leaves the reader hanging in suspense, the action shifts to 1963, starting with some of the fallout from the "Great Train Robbery" of that year and focusing on the coming-of-age of 17-year-old John Hathaway, whose father is one of Brighton's leading thugs. In the final section, set in the present, Det. Sgt. Sarah Gilchrist and ex-Chief Constable Bob Watts look into a series of sadistic murders that may be connected with an earlier massacre that affected both of them as well as with the unsolved real-life 1934 Brighton Trunk Murder. References to 1960s celebrities lend color but otherwise distract from the main story. (June)