MCKENZIE’S FRIEND

Another noir thriller from Dubliner Davison follows p.i. Harry Fielding (Crooked Man, 2002) as he searches London’s underworld for a wealthy publicist’s missing daughter.

To call Harry Fielding a private investigator would be something of a compliment: he’s basically a thug with a gun who takes money for doing things that could land him in jail. Formerly employed by MI5 as an “understrapper” (freelance operative) specializing in “nonexistent” missions (murder or blackmail, say), he grew weary of taking out the trash for government twits and swore never to accept another shady job. He even celebrated his return to respectability by taking his father on a fishing trip in the Lake District—only to be tracked down there by his old pal Alfie, a crooked cop recently suspended for taking bribes. Alfie spells trouble for anyone trying to turn over a new leaf, and, sure enough, he has a job for Harry. Vanessa Harquin, daughter of hotshot p.r. man Sydney Holland, has been missing for over a month, and Holland (fearing that the police have given up) has hired Alfie to find her. It looks like nice clean work for good money, but Harry is reluctant to join Alfie. First, Alfie has gone to pieces since his suspension, having taken to pulling guns on people in barroom brawls. Second, Holland seems to be hiding something from Harry and Alfie. And, third, the case will bring Harry uncomfortably close to Alfie’s wife Ruth, with whom he once had a brief affair. Still, Harry takes the case anyway—only to find every one of his fears realized. Is this any job for a man trying to go straight?

Elegant but flat. Davison pushes his characters’ nihilism to such an extreme that, after a while, the engines driving his story (i.e., the pursuit of truth and justice) become too flooded with cynicism to turn over.