James Owen
Tropical Noir
On a hot, still night in June 1965, a soldier walked into the town of Monte Plata, in the Dominican Republic, to report that he had accidentally shot dead two policemen. There was more, though. Next to their bodies was that of a young Canadian Catholic missionary, Father Arthur MacKinnon, killed in circumstances that, at the very least, appeared obscure.
The official version was that he had died after refusing to stop at a roadblock, but there was no blood in the car and the bullets had entered him at close range, from behind. To the other priests who buried him, it seemed certain that he had been
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'Within hours, the news spread. A grimy gang of desperadoes had been captured just in time to stop them setting out on an assassination plot of shocking audacity.'
@katheder on the Cato Street Conspiracy of 1820.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/butchers-knives-treason-and-plot
'It is the ... sketches of the local and the overlooked that lend this book its density and drive, and emphasise Britain’s mostly low-key riches – if only you can be bothered to buy an anorak and seek.'
Jonathan Meades on the beauty of brutalism.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/castles-of-concrete
'Cruickshank’s history reveals an extraordinary eclecticism of architectural styles and buildings, from Dutch Revivalism to Arts and Crafts experimentation, from Georgian terraces to Victorian mansion blocks.'
William Boyd on the architecture of Chelsea.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/where-george-eliot-meets-mick-jagger