Friday afternoon, and the traffic is bloody murder.
Sergeant Belinda 'Billy' Kidd is driving home from the airport, jet-lagged and ready to resign from a career that has left her traumatised. Menopause has robbed her confidence too - now she's a traffic cop who's afraid to drive. When brake lights haemorrhage up the motorway, the cars grind to a halt. Moments later she finds a dead driver in a black sedan.
He has a metal skewer in his neck. But how? The killer can't have left the scene without being spotted by the dozens of witnesses - so he must still be there, among them. If the traffic jam stays put, they're all in danger; if the traffic clears, she'll lose her suspect. The clock is ticking, but she doesn't know how fast.
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Dead Mile by Jo Furniss was published on 4 July 2024 by Zaffre. My thanks to the publisher who sent my copy for review as part of this Blog Tour organised by Compulsive Readers.
Recently, it feels as though these stories have exploded, with plots set in actual locked rooms, to those taking place in usually isolated places such as deserted islands and old manor houses.
Jo Furniss has created her own locked-room mystery with a massive difference. Her setting is a grid-locked motorway, just outside of London. Miles and miles of traffic, standing still with nowhere to go, and one dead body. There's been a murder in one of the cars and the suspect just has to be in the area, there's nowhere for them to go.
Lead character; Sergeant Belinda Kidd, known to all as Billy is also stuck in that traffic jam. Recently returned from Australia and driving a hire car, she's on the verge of resigning from her job. Recent events have led to her decision, she's tired, she no longer likes driving, or her job.
Terrorists have attacked the Deadwall Tunnel with car bombs and all roads are closed. As the occupants of the stopped vehicles start to get out of their cars and vans and lorries, Belinda discovers a dead man in a car in the queue. There is no doubt that he's been murdered; the metal stake in the back of his neck proves that.
Despite her feelings about her job, she's a policewoman, she knows that the murderer has to be in the vicinity and her training kicks in. Alone, with no back up expected for hours, she begins to try to make the car secure, to keep the evidence and to also stop other passengers from interfering.
It's a fast paced and intriguing story. Belinda is a great character, a little different, quite troubled, but also determined. Whilst the story is told from Belinda's point of view in the main, the author also introduces other lead characters and the reader is aware of their own thoughts. It soon becomes clear that there are people in the traffic jam with issues of their own, and this just adds to the mystery.
It's an intense read, with the very small area for the action to take place, this adds a depth to the novel that increases the enjoyment. The character development is finely paced, the tension increases throughout.
An unusual novel in both premise and setting with a lead character who is cleverly created. Something quite different and recommended by me.
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Her novels include the survival thriller, All the Little Children, which was an Amazon Chart bestseller in the UK and US. Jo has contributed short stories to the Afraid of the Light anthology series, which was nominated for the CWA Dagger Awards in 2021/22, and raised thousands of pounds for British charities.
A former BBC broadcast journalist, Jo also writes for the award-winning SHORT HISTORY OF podcast from Noiser Productions.
Visit her at JoFurniss.com or follow her on Instagram @jofurnissauthor and Twitter @Jo_Furniss
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