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Gallowstree Lane: 'An authentic depiction of gang life and police politics' From the author of ITV's The Tower

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A really good read, each character playing an important part to the story, naturally picking up pace at the end for the ultimate show down. Lizzie is struggling to give Conor the care that he deserves and do her job, but most single parents feel the same way. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Spencer was just fifteen years old when he stepped out into a London Street and asked a complete stranger for help, begging him not to let him die. On the other hand, I have very strong negative emotions about her involvement with a married man in the first place, and that is what made her and Kieran (the married detective) my least favourite characters in this book.

I was being asked to follow different parts of the story happening simultaneously and was feeling no empathy with any of the characters, although experience told me that it would probably all come together at the end. It is told from four points of view, Sarah, Lizzie, Kieran and Ryan and far from being distracting it is absorbing, giving the reader different takes on the same incident and a comprehensive overview.Ryan Harris, witnesses his friend’s murder and is left reeling by his death and panics when he’s arrested for a fight he got into, a few days before. Ryan introduces his friend Spence to his new world and together they set out on a path that would be short lived. It’s a cracking story, told largely from the point of view of two female police officers, Sarah and Lizzie, one in each investigation, and also of Ryan, a very young gang member who becomes caught up in events which are well beyond him. She finished her career working as part of a Major Investigation Team on the Metropolitan Police Service’s Homicide Command. All are well painted, but it is Ryan’s story and character which really makes this special; I found the picture of him, his circumstances and his actions completely convincing and in many ways sympathetic.

What would be the outcome for Shaw’s operation with the craziness that was happening across London, threatening everything they’d worked for? It’s something we really need to understand and Kate London really does show insight into this serious current problem. Gallowstree Lane" is the third in the Collins and Griffiths series written by Kate London and although I haven't read any in the series before, I feel this could still work as a standalone if wished. This book is a real page turner and one I was able to read really quickly, it constantly kept me guessing, just when you think all the ends are starting to tie up and you think you’ve worked out where the story is going something else happens to prove you wrong. The plot is quite fast-paced and filled with a lot of findings, and I really enjoyed the whole investigation experience.We also learn that Lizzie is a single mother bringing up Kieran’s son and they also have history with Sarah from a previous incident. Fifteen year old Spencer has been stabbed in the leg and bleeds out on the street while an off duty paramedic tries to assist. The pacing of this novel was quite slow to start off with, with plenty of the mundane and kinda depressing details about the personal lives of the investigating officers. Given the series title, I assumed (Sarah) Collins and (Lizzie) Griffiths were a team but in fact it turns out their paths have crossed only briefly in the course of previous cases.

An investigation into one of London's tit for tat killings can't be allowed to derail Perseus and let the master criminals go free. How Kate London managed to weave together all these hitherto separate parts of the story and keep them running in real time, I don’t know. Kate London is a former murder detective, having worked with the Major Investigation Team of the Metropolitan Police Service’s Homicide Command, which I feel gives this novel an edge.Yes, the slang, used in everyday communication between London’s youth, that was what hooked me on this book. Regrettably, this means that there are long periods of sitting around doing little with sudden bursts of activity. I was worried that because the first look at this book was so fast paced and so engaging that it would slow down later in the book, I was totally wrong.

Where the book really shined was in the descriptions of police procedure and the complexities of gang politics. I won’t say more but he and others caught up in this life come across as very real and complex characters rather than one dimensional stereotypes. Already caught up in Perseus and with the Bluds, Ryan's got his own demons and his own ideas about what's important.The author analyses very important topics in this book, such as teenage criminals, knife crime, gangs and their war for territory, prostitution, drug addictions, childcare issues for working single mothers etc. Now don’t get me wrong, I know men have feelings but London only gave me glimpses as Kieran fought to save all his hardwork of the past two years, they gave the novel balance with their harder, more pragmatic approach. Thank you to Atlantic Books/Corvus for this eARC via NetGalley of ‘Gallowstree Lane’, due to be published on 7th February.

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