CI5 hq

This story undoes me. It's one of those ones that scoured my heart out the first time I read it - and I still have to steel myself to reread it. But for all the right reasons really. Because she takes me so fully into this world of a damaged Doyle (she's one of the few who can make him this vulnerable without destroying his masculinity), and a Bodie who is, as you rightly say, absolutely magnificent in his role as lover, agent, and friend.

It's a premise few dare to take on - Bodie in love with Doyle's sister? Engaged to her? But then, that's Angelfish. She's the one who gives them children - dead and alive - wives, teaching jobs in the Hebrides, lovers who die in climbing accidents... It's always a deep breath with her to see where she'll go, but for me it's always worth it.

Though here I agree, neither the Ann Holly or Murphy inclusion work for me. The Murphy scene in particular feels unnecessary. And the ending is intense but a little confusing after the rollercoaster that built up to it.

I do love this, though. I can remember whole chunks of it because it made such a deep impressionon me the first two or three times I read it.

Thanks for reccing this, a great choice and you did it justice.