Research by Philip Kerr - #TuesdayTeaser

Hello and welcome to this week's Tuesday Teaser. The place where we take a sneaky peek at a book that has caught my eye.

This week we are looking at Research by Philip Kerr.

Philip is a renowned author, having published 14 books in his Bernie Gunther series, and three titles in his Scot Manson series. Research is a stand alone novel which I am looking forward to reading.

He has also published a series of children's novels, The Children of the Lamp, under the name P.B. Kerr.

Sadly, Philip passed away in 2018 at the age of 62, leaving a considerable body of work. He is a real loss to literature.

The Blurb

If you want to write a murder mystery, you have to do some research... or pay someone else to do it for you.

In a luxury flat in Monaco, John Houston's supermodel wife lies in bed, a bullet in her skull.

Houston is the world's most successful thriller writer, the playboy head of a literary empire that produces far more books than he could ever actually write. Now the man who has invented hundreds of bestselling killings is wanted for a real murder and on the run from the police, his life transformed into something out of one of his books.

And in London, the ghostwriter who is really behind those books has some questions for him too...

In the Beginning...

Part One - Don Irvine's Story

It was the American novelist William Faulkner who once said that in writing you must kill all your darlings; it was Mike Munns - another writer but, like me, not half as good as Faulkner - who made a joke out of this quote when he telephoned my flat in Putney early that Tuesday morning.

"It's me, Mike. I've heard of kill your darlings but this is ridiculous."

"Mike. What the hell? It's not even eight o'clock."

"Don, listen, switch on Sky News and then call me at home. John's only gone and killed Orla. Not to mention both of her pet dogs."

I don't watch much television any more than I read much Faulkner but I got out of bed and went into the kitchen, made a pot of tea, switched on the telly, and after a few seconds was reading a rolling strip of news across the bottom of the screen: 

BESTSELLING NOVELIST JOHN HOUSTON'S WIFE FOUND MURDERED AT THEIR LUXURY APARTMENT IN MONACO. 

About ten minutes later the twinkly-eyed Irish news anchor was announcing the bare facts of the story before asking a local reporter positioned outside the distinctive glass fan entrance way to the Tour Odeon, "What more can you tell us about this, Riva?"

Riva, a fit-looking blonde wearing a black pencil skirt and a beige pussy-cat-bow blouse, explained what was known...

Well, that was an exciting beginning. Has it made you want to read on?