Daniel Cole (1) (1983–)

With a gruesome stitched-together corpse, many readers will probably expect Daniel Cole's Ragdoll to be filled to overflowing with gore. Surprisingly, it isn't. What it does have is a breakneck pace, a wonderfully convoluted plot, and an intense cast of characters. For a character-driven reader like myself, Cole's cast is what made the book. No, I couldn't solve the mystery ahead of time-- which is always a plus-- but the characters are what wouldn't let me go.

The trainee Edmunds is show more brilliant at wading through mountains of information and digging up the facts that they need to solve the crime. In addition, he may be new in position, but he has the intestinal fortitude to stand up to his superiors when he feels that he is in the right. The entire team may be saddled with a pencil-pushing, media-hungry, wardrobe nightmare of a boss, but the detectives' immediate supervisor, Simmons, is a good man who gets right in the thick of the investigation with them and buckles down to do some of the grunt work. How often does that happen?

Emily Baxter has a terrible temper, is an even worse driver, and secretly pines for Fawkes, who knows her flaws and has been known to cover for her when necessary. Fawkes himself goes spectacularly off the rails, and this makes him very unpredictable. With these two main characters, readers are never quite sure what's going to happen.

Although the ending of Ragdoll unraveled a bit, I really enjoyed the story and the characters, and I'm looking forward to reading the next book, Hangman, which will be out at the end of July. show less

I’ve read a boatload of police procedural/thrillers & I can’t remember the last time I was so impressed by a debut novel. Gobsmacking. This is a lean, fast paced story that serves up an intricate plot full of great characters with a generous side of black humour.

The book opens on the last day of the “Cremation Killer” trial at the Old Bailey. Det. William “Wolf” Layton-Fawkes has a lot riding on the verdict & when the dust settles, he’s lost it all.

Four years later we find show more Wolf demoted, divorced & living in a crappy flat. He’s tried to put his notoriety behind him but the past is about to rear its ugly head……literally. He & colleague DS Emily Baxter are called out when a body is found in his neighbourhood. What they discover boggles the mind (and stomach) of everyone at the scene. Suspended from the ceiling is a body comprised of parts taken from 6 victims.

Hmmm….probably not going to be solved by tea time. Wolf & the rest of the homicide unit get to work trying to find the owner of each piece. Meanwhile, ambitious crime reporter Andrea Fawkes is trying to make sense of a list of names she received in the mail. When news breaks of the body, its meaning becomes clear & more than a little worrying. The final entry on the list is William Layton-Fawkes, her ex-husband.

Buckle up, people. You’re in for a wild & frequently hilarious ride. The cops have their work cut out for them as they try to contact those on the list & figure out their connection while keeping the media at bay. For Wolf, the names trigger a vague memory & as the story progresses we gradually learn what happened in the aftermath of the CK trial.

Nuff said about the plot. Believe me, it heads off in directions you’ll never see coming. Somehow the author has managed to incorporate the mundane scut work necessary to solve a case without ever slowing the pace. Dialogue is sharp & each of these well defined characters has a distinct voice. It’s riddled with humour of the dark, often inappropriate variety that effectively breaks up the eeww-ier moments.

At the centre of it all is Wolf, a weary & embattled man who tends to colour outside the lines. He & Emily have a complicated relationship & he depends on her to keep him in check. Her character is smart & funny, a strong woman who doesn’t care whose feathers she ruffles as long as it gets results.

There is so much more to the story but seriously, you need to stop reading this & get your mitts on a copy. It’s the kind of read you’ll resent having to put down. Highly recommended, especially for fans of Stuart MacBride & Jay Stringer. show less

This is the second book in the Detective William Fawkes series and it brings us back to some familiar names and a host of new ones. Baxter is back and as charming as ever!

Although it’s not imperative to have read the first book “Ragdoll” to enjoy this one I would strongly recommend that you do to fully appreciate the continuing storyline. There is enough detail in this one to get you through but you would be missing out on a really great start to this series. As well as the answer to a show more major question, Who is William Fawkes?!

I absolutely loved Ragdoll so I had extremely high hopes for this one and it certainly didn’t disappoint, if anything I think Hangman is the more superior of the two. More standout characters, more action and a lot more dead bodies!

Set between New York and London Baxter is called to different crime scenes in different countries with very distinct ties, on the chest of the seemingly unrelated victims is the word Bait carved into the skin and on the chests of the killers, the word Puppet has been cut into their flesh.

As the body count grows and the brutality of each crime scene escalates it is almost impossible to figure out where the story is headed next. Can it all be the work of one perpetrator pulling all the strings or is it the works of a cult? Serial killer or terrorist? As for the who and they why, that finally drops into place but not until the closing chapters of the book and even though a lot of questions finally get answered it also leaves some pretty big unanswered ones!

I just hope that Mr Cole writes extremely quick because waiting even a few weeks to find out what happens next is going to be to long a wait!

Ragdoll is out now so go grab a copy and prepare yourself for this must read of 2018 – Hangman. show less

Frequent readers of crime fiction tend to be over some plot element or standard form or another. It's hard to avoid getting a little jaded when a particular structure shows up time and time again - and in my case it's been serial killers for sometime now. Which does at least mean that it's a discomfortingly nice surprise when you come across an interesting twist on the tired old form.

Which, of course means, that you've taken a punt on something with a blurb that's guaranteed to be show more off-putting. For this reader there was something about the author's bio and the blurb of RAGDOLL that hinted at something out of the ordinary. Mercifully there didn't seem to be slightest indication (nor eventuality) that time would be spent in the killer's head, whilst they explained their twisted little justifications ad infinitum. Whatever it was that made me pick up RAGDOLL though, thank goodness it was there. This is a brilliant book, and I'm acutely aware how dodgy that sounds, what with the whole serial killer thing and all.

That's not to say that there's not a hefty serving of ick about the discovery of dismembered human remains, sewn together and strung up like a puppet. Hence the "Ragdoll Killer" nomenclature from the press.

That's not to say that there's not a stressed, fragile, and flawed central character. In fact Detective Wolf Fawkes raises each of those to a new high, and adds highly suspect into the bargain. His offsider is the only person who can work with him for a whole heap of complicated, nuanced or blazingly obvious reasons.

And it's definitely not to say that there's not quite a headliner to the whole serial killer plot - what with a list of intended victims, and the dates of their deaths delivered straight into the hands of a slightly less than eager member of the press - she being the ex-wife of Wolf Fawkes and all. His is, after all, the last name on the list and the divorce wasn't that acrimonious.

RAGDOLL has a beautifully twisted storyline, peopled with wonderfully flawed human beings, delivered a break-neck pace. There's enough surprising twists and turns to the plot elements to allow the standard clichés - like the tension with upper echelons, and the difficulties in forming working partnerships - play out against suspicion and the sheer weirdness of having a list of victims who the police are desperately trying to identify and protect. Then there's the complication of connecting the dots between them. What do a series of seemingly random killings have to do with each other, and does that answer provide even the vaguest hint about a killer who is resourceful, cunning and very deadly.

It's been a while since finishing a debut book made me mildly miffed I'd have to wait a while for the second in the series. Particularly as the end of RAGDOLL does not in anyway telegraph where a second might be heading, let alone starting out. Which statement is trying to be deliberately tantalising because really this is a debut book everyone should be reading - serial killer allergy or not.

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/review-ragdoll-daniel-cole show less