Crime

Jaded Edinburgh cop and substance-abuser (probably a redundant descriptor in an Irvine Welsh novel...) Ray Lennox has been granted compassionate leave after a particularly traumatic child-murder case leads to a breakdown, and he is spending some time relaxing in Miami with his fiancée. Within 48 hours of landing in the US, however, he finds himself in a situation where a young girl needs his protection from sexual predators, in circumstances where he can't very well turn to the proper authorities for help, and of course all the doubts and questions flying around in his mind from the recent investigation come back to haunt him.

Despite the obviously contrived setup, this turns out to be a very engaging, disturbing book, whose brutal show more plot somehow manages to deal with the fraught subject of sexual abuse of children in a sensitive and often surprisingly subtle way. Although it is probably a book you will want to read quickly to get it over with... show less

The first two thirds of this accessible, fast paced, novel are excellent. It balances the trauma and PTSD being suffered by Det Lennox in the wake of a horrific child abduction, rape and murder and the sheer banality of its perpetrator. As the novel unwraps it's clear that there are other incidents that have led him to be the wrecked addict that he is, but also the most (over?) zealous defender of children.

A night of drug fueled and frankly quite dull sounding indulgence (Welsh as always is great on the the sheer unbridled need driving excessive drug use - not much fun, lots of hard work and hustling, danger and uncertainty ever present) leads him to the young Tiana, who is a best laxly parented and at worst the repeated victim of show more paedophiles.

Is Lennox just triggered to be over sensitive to preying nonces? He decides he can't take a chance and takes off with Tiana across Florida to the care of "Chet" who may, or may not be Tiana's uncle. In this section Welsh reduces the pressure for an amusing travelogue of central Florida as the nearly middle aged Lennox, and the precocious Tiana get to know each other, Lennox well aware that to the passerby, it might like him who is the abductor of a child.

So far, so engrossing. Child abuse must be an extraordinary difficult subject to write about, and Welsh does an admirable job of doing it without the reader wanting to slam the book shut in disgust. Never is the abuse voyeuristic - never are the paedophiles less than slick and convincing. But the denoument isn't convincing; this isn't to suggest that abuse rings don't exist, but that its hard to believe they operate in the way described here.

So this is well worth reading, but not perfect. But Welsh deserves huge credit for tackling an impossible subject and turning it into a credible human story rather than a diatribe show less

In this book, a sort of Rebus-meets-Lolita, Hearts-supporting copper Ray Lennox is on holiday in Florida with his fiancée. He is traumatised by a harrowing murder investigation and the sacking of George Burley (probably in that order)and is supposed to be relaxing. Instead he gets involved with some serious American low-lifes and sets out to prove that smashing paedophile rings is not incompatible with leaving rants on football message boards.

It’s intelligently written, serious as befits its subject matter, in places exceptionally grim and –for a parent – it makes disturbing reading. It was more measured than other books I have read by Irvine Welsh, and though it does feature drugs (almost inevitable, really), they are not show more sprinkled over every page – more like a discreet nostril-full.

I did think the narrative dragged in paces – particularly in the second half, where a good proportion of the story was resolved and very little was left to sort, and yet a good hundred pages remained. Some was taken up with flashbacks to the main character’s childhood, which were excellent, but the Miami side of the action seemed to take an age to conclude even though the direction was clear from early on. show less

The strange thing about Irvine Welsh is that, against the odds, Trainspotting made an excellent film and no doubt, in the right hands, his latest book would make an even better one since it has a fairly straightforward story line, a minimum of incomprehensible brogue and a reasonably upbeat conclusion.

My advice to all except die hard Welsh fans is: Wait for the Movie. Although it is an improvement on Porno, the last of his books I read, Crime is little more than an average literary novel with a strong plot.

The story begins with Detective Inspector Ray Lennox [whom regular readers will remember from Filth] flying to Miami Beach with his fiancé Trudi for a holiday, during which they will make wedding plans and attempt to resuscitate show more their moribund sex life.

As the story unfolds it becomes clear that Lennox, who is recovering from a mental breakdown, is conflicted about the upcoming marriage and, having recently and reluctantly given up cocaine, has started to abuse alcohol instead.

Impatient, bad tempered and jittery, longing for a line of coke and hitting the booze with reckless abandon, it is only a matter of time before he snaps and attacks Trudi, whose attempts to rehabilitate him he resents.

“And it hits him, in her look and tone, just how desperate he really is. He wants to say ‘I’m dying, help me, please’, but it comes out in a monotone shrug as, - I’m just doing what I want to on a holiday. If you don’t like it, fuck off. “

After Trudi departs in outraged distress, Ray starts trawling seedy bars until he is picked up by two women, accompanies them home, and the three of them embark on a cocaine binge which Ray halts immediately when he realizes there is a young girl in the flat, the 10-year-old daughter of the more desperate of his companions.

As the story continues, the reader learns Ray’s breakdown was precipitated by a case he was assigned involving the abduction, rape, torture and murder of a little girl: although he caught the killer, it was too late to prevent the child’s death.

He joined the police specifically to get into the serious crimes unit and concentrate on the monsters – ‘nonces’ he calls them – who prey on children. Driven on the job, his personal life suffered, hence the self-medication with cocaine and alcohol.

Eventually the reason for Ray’s crusade against child sex offenders [I mean adults who assault children, not children who commit sexual offences] is revealed: he and his best friend Les were assaulted by three paedophiles when they were 12. Ray was forced to fellate one but still got off lightly in comparison to Les who was anally raped twice.

Over twenty years later, Les has made his peace with what happened, concentrating on his family and the present but Ray is haunted and consumed by the episode.

When he finds himself plunged into the middle of a child sex ring in Florida, he takes it very personally, making himself responsible for Tianna, the victim, going on the run with her and, having discovered a senior member of the syndicate is a police officer, able to trust nobody.

Although Welsh now lives in Dublin, his characters remain resolutely Scottish: he approaches Florida as a tourist and his descriptions, while detailed and homey, are far from enticing.

Bloodthirsty marauding alligators and mosquitoes, huge ethnic and geographical class distinctions, monolithic communal blocks which, despite interior luxury and spaciousness, are eyesores on the exterior, and a lifestyle that accepts and even encourages conspicuous consumption on the part of the lucky few.

Sinister child sex syndicates, cruel and ruthless manipulation of needy single mothers and their desperately-seeking-a-daddy daughters, psychological torture and a network with corrupt cancerous branches everywhere, the suppositions behind Welsh’s Crime are completely compelling.

On the downside, this author continues to take liberties with punctuation and irritates with his frequent and entirely unnecessary use of dialect: “Fucking seek ay they things” – what does that mean, exactly? “– Ah’m no gaunny say nowt -” the brogue and the use of dashes rather than inverted commas is a stylistic affectation which can get tedious.

A story of dark desires, aberrant sexuality, alternative lifestyles and a fundamentally decent man battling the demons that possess him and struggling to recognize and embrace the good in his life, Crime is the story of Everyman. show less

I just could not get into this book. It started off with all of the standards of an Irvine Welsh book, but it got, boring. Not something I expected from the author. The subject matter was also a little too disturbing. Heald way through I just decided to skip through the rest of the book. Definitely not one of his better books. At least not for me.

Hard to read because of the crimes involved (sexual abuse of children) and the unsparing vivid portrayals of poor and/or criminal persons, but I couldn’t put it down. The character of the Edinburgh policeman is very well drawn, the plot is full of turns.

Excellent read, and possibly the most accessible Irvine Welsh I have read. a copper (who worked with Robbo in Welsh's previous novel "Flilth") goes to Miami on holiday and comes up against a paedophile ring. Disturbing, but thrilling and will have you very involved by the end.