Dead at First Sight (Roy Grace, 15)

Product Information

It is clear that nothing is as it seems when Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is called to investigate the suicide of a woman in Brighton. As his enquiries continue, a handsome Brighton motivational speaker comes forward. He’s discovered his identity is being used to scam eleven different women who are looking for love online. The first he knew of it was a phone call from one of them, out of the blue, saying, ‘You don’t know me, but I thought I knew you’.

Roy is haunted by the disappearance of his wife, Sandy, when Detective Sergeant Glenn Branson asks him for help with a case…Author Peter James created the tenacious detective and has published many novels following his fictional investigations. Peter takes his readers on a thrill ride, and hopefully we’ve managed to capture some of that runaway rollercoaster feeling.” Detective Superintendent Roy Grace investigates when a young woman’s body is found butchered in Brighton. His DS Roy Grace books have been translated into 37 languages with worldwide sales of over 21 million copies.

Roy Grace finds it difficult to work with his boss, the power-crazed, Cassian Pew. Despite this, he still runs a tight ship and investigates with precision. The operational details and personality clashes in the office add realism to the story. Roy and his wife Cleo have difficult times with Roy’s son, Bruno, from his first marriage to Sandy; Sandy is his first wife who disappeared and then returned years later, died, and left Roy with a son he never knew he had. He has another son, Noah, with Cleo so the dynamics of family life and being a detective clash throughout the story. A man waits at a London airport for Ingrid Ostermann, the love of his life, to arrive. Across the Atlantic, a retired NYPD cop waits in a bar in Florida’s Key West for his first date with the lady who is, without question, his soulmate. The two men are about to discover they’ve been scammed out of almost every penny they have in the world – and that neither women exist. Peter James is meticulous in his research but on occasion veers into political correctness – he has written of “male police officers in uniform” when surely the much simpler “uniformed policemen” would suffice – and I don’t understand why he refers to the police and their “civilian aides”. Peter James has penetrated the inner workings of police procedures, and the inner thoughts and attitudes of real detectives, as no English crime writer before him. His hero, Roy Grace, may not be the most lively cop, nor the most damaged by drink, weight or misery, but he’s one of the most believable – The Times Reply 10 Trending Fiction Books of March '21 - World of Books | Book Blog March 25, 2021 at 2:03 amHe says: “It’s a seemingly straightforward missing person inquiry which twists off into territory awash with nightmare fuel.