Halo Parade - Softcover

Bill James has been called "the Elmore Leonard of Britain's underworld" (Kirkus Reviews) and has been named a "Master of Crime" in a mystery roundup by the London Sunday Times, which said, "There is nothing else quite like this series of police procedurals. James is concerned with the dilemmas and difficulties of policing Britain's inner cities, and he addresses these in hard-edged narratives that leave readers gasping and flinching, praying the people in these stories never come to live in their streets." In addition to the Harpur and Iles series, James is the author of other mystery series and a book on Anthony Powell. He lives in Wales.

The third cynical police procedural featuring Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur (Lolita Man, p. 507) finds him disconsolate: his mistress, the widow of a fellow officer, has recently married another cop; and Ray Street, the young lad whom Colin sent undercover to infiltrate druglord ``You-know-who'' and his gang, is now also snorting up and recklessly endangering himself. When Street is murdered, Harpur plants evidence implicating You-know-who, but a crafty barrister sways the jury, and You-know-who is free to go after drug courier-turned-witness Peter Lowery--soon an arson victim with his former pal Celia. The extralegal comeuppance for You-know-who finds rank-and-file cops applauding the vigilante justice rendered by their superiors, who have avenged one of their own, the dead Ray Street. A gritty, unpleasant look at the dark side of passion--from Street's servicing of the homosexual druglord to Harpur and his mistress resuming their affair just days after her marriage. A dark, dour study of good men with sour edges. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.