At the start of Banks’s excellent sequel to 2008’s Saturday’s Child
, Manchester PI and ex-con Callum Innes is taking a break from the investigation business by working as a caretaker at the Lad’s Club, a boxing gym run by Paulo Gray. Paulo decides to send Cal to Los Angeles with young Liam Wooley, who’s fighting in an amateur bout there. Cal’s not happy about going, but Paulo’s the boss, so the two fly off to L.A. and into trouble. In what turns out to be a serious mistake, Cal links up with Nelson Byrne, an ex-boxer he meets in a bar. Before Liam gets to fight his final bout, Nelson’s dead, Cal’s been shot and Liam’s been drugged and kidnapped. The writing is the real star of the book: violent, dark, funny and always profane. When a tough guy in L.A. threatens him, the unintimidated Cal replies, “I been told and warned by people who could shit you without grunting.” This is the cream of contemporary British noir. (Feb.)
