Indie Light

So a quick piece of boilerplate before I get on with the review, I am currently taking part in a blog tour organised by the awesome Rachel’s Random Resources (who I strongly suggest you reach out to if you are an author who wants help with connecting to a wider audience of dedicated readers and bloggers).

While I’ve been asked to review this submission as part of the aforementioned blog tour, I can confirm I am in no way affiliated with the author or the blog tour host, nor am I being paid for taking part. In fact you can expect the same standard of quality, as well as the honest and fair and balanced approach that I take to all the content on the site.

Okay, now that that’s out of the way, let’s continue with the review, today I will be talking about ‘A Friend in Deed’ by G.D Harper, and this isn’t the only time I’ve reviewed works by the author either, and you can click here and here to read those. Now let me tell you a little about the author, he’s a graduate of Glasgow University (which he attended from 1975 to 1978) and during this period he lived in the West End of Glasgow. It was in fact those experiences, which helped to shape the background of his previous two books ‘Love’s Long Road’ and ‘Silent Money’. If you’re interested in finding out more about the author you can visit his website or social media by following him on Facebook and Twitter.

Now we finally arrive at my thoughts on ‘A Friend in Deed’, and where better to begin that with the recurring themes/elements of these reviews of G.D Harpers work, the reality within the fiction. By which I mean, his attention to detail regarding setting, it helps to flesh it out and make it the engaging narrative that it is. In this case, he actually lived and worked in Russia and Ukraine, which informed the backdrop, much the same way his period living in Scotland brought authenticity to the previous two novels.

I enjoyed this book immensely, it focuses on the near future, which is a distinct change as his previous two novels were set in the past. A Friend in Deed deals with politics, journalism and conspiracy and ties it all up into a complex and gritty thriller that was deeply engaging and continued to build on the goodwill generated by the author from the quality of his previous works.

While I have little to no first hand knowledge of Russia, I am a journalist and so I was able to connect more deeply with the main character Duncan Jones, although that being said, all of his characters come off well, rich and real, but even though I was able to find something personal that connected me more deeply to the narrative, I don’t feel like it’s necessary or required to appreciate and be swept away by it. Additionally, this isn’t the first time we’ve met Duncan, if you have read his other two books then you might recognise him from ‘Love’s Long Road’, although the character has grown and developed as you might expect over the years.

I mentioned above that the characters resonate quite well, that’s in no small part due to the writing skill of Harper, I’ve been impressed with it throughout these blog tours and he is on top form with this book, in fact it’s perhaps my favourite of the three I’ve reviewed. I will say that I find it easy to get into a book, even one I’m not particularly enjoying, but I was surprised by how quickly I got caught up in this one, perhaps it was my familiarity with the author’s style by this point that made it easier or perhaps it was just that based even on the synopsis I was really excited to have a read at it, but either way I hammered through this exceptionally quickly.

I’ve made a point several times now of talking about the setting and the realism written into the books, and again as I mentioned up top, the author is truly a master at this, he creates such a clear and evocative picture that I strongly believe he could make even the mundane readable. That being said, he really managed to bring something else to this one. I’m very politically active and interested, I feel apathy or disinterest only serves to make this country worse, but with everything going on in Trump’s America, and of course the whole Brexit debacle closer to home it’s a very heated time for the political structure of the world and this book manages to capture that very palpable tension and energy present and spin gold from it.

Overall, I would have to say that this book presents honestly, the world it is today, with a startling faithfulness, we are sucked in on page one and held captive by the engrossing plot, characters and backdrop until we are deposited on the final page, satisfied by the clever political thriller, and ever so slightly ambivalent about it ending because it’s over. Although it does mean I can start again. So with that in mind I have no reservations about giving this book a 5/5. Make sure and grab yourself a copy over on Amazon.