TEN-SECOND STAIRCASE

TITLE: TEN-SECOND STAIRCASE
AUTHOR: CHRISTOPHER FOWLER
Pages: 400
Date: 19/02/2010
Grade: 4+
Details: no. 4 Bryant & May Mystery
Library

When a controversial artist is killed and left as part of her own highly inflamable "work of art" and the only witness describes the murderer as a masked highwayman on a black horse, you can be sure it is a case for the Peculiar Crime Unit.
But, with the units existence under threat of closure and the highwayman committing more seemingly impossible murders without leaving any clues, this case may well signal the end for Bryant and May.
And when the case appears to be connected to an unsolved years old crime spree which had devastating concequences for May, things get even less clear and the two old investigators start doubting their own effectiveness. What is more, the end of the mystery could spell personal disaster for the two men once again.
These books are very well plotted and Fowler always manages to find reasonable explanations for that which appears impossible.
Bryant is great fun to read about with his excentricity and quirkiness, whereas May's more traditional methods provide just the right contrast.
The only reason this book didn't score higher lies in it being at times a bit too wordy for my liking, slowing both the book and the investigation in it down and making me almost lose interest on one or two occassions.