David Carter | Updates

New Website....

David Carter — Fri, 6 Nov 2026 00:00:00 +0000

We hope you like our new website.

It is almost an identical title. We have only moved from Co.UK to .Com

The new address being: Davidcarterbooks.com.

So much easier to add new books with all the links to various retailers.

Now, all we need to do is complete some more new books, and that is what we are working flat out on!

Have a great day.

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The NEW Inspector Walter Darriteau case is now available to pre-order...

David Carter — Wed, 21 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The NEW Inspector Walter Darriteau book, "Missing Letters" will be relased on July 18th 2025. It will be available as an Ebook or in paperback. Available to order now on pre-order.

Here is the blurb:

Pamela Grayson stays late on a warm summer Friday evening. A bookkeeper, employed in a struggling business, her boss needs new figures for the accountant and bank manager. Pam is happy to oblige, the only one remaining in the office.

Figures massaged and bullied into the best order, she sets them on the boss’s desk, and leaves the building to drive to her Chester apartment by the burbling river.

On the thirty-minute trip, she doesn’t consider cop cars and bikes and radar traps, thinking instead of her estranged boyfriend and his plans for the weekend. Breaking the speed limit is not unusual for Pam, and that evening, she is lucky.

Arriving home, relieved to slip off her work shoes, she debates on hot drink or cold. In the cool flat, she doesn’t yet know she isn’t alone.

So begins “Missing Letters”, the sixteenth case in the Inspector Walter Darriteau series.

Walter is going to be busy, but not on police work, for he has left the country, accompanying his friend Marina Moo to Hong Kong. She is divorcing and needs a confidant to see her through.

He has no idea what is happening in England. He has more important things on his mind, events that will change his life forever.

“Missing Letters”, another chunky Walter Darriteau book running to over 450 pages.

“Missing Letters”, embracing three continents, and ninety years of turbulent British and family history, and available to order now.

Make sure you don't miss it. CLICK HERE to order to ensure you receive your copy on the day of release.

Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoy it.

Tags: English detective stories. British detectives. Walter Darriteau. Gritty cop novels. Fast paced detective stories. Northern police novels.

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Last Day Today to Grab Your Special Offer on "Kissing a Killer".

David Carter — Tue, 20 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

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"Kissing a Killer" is Book of the Day today at EReaderCafe...

David Carter — Sun, 18 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

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SPECIAL OFFER on "Kissing a KIller".

David Carter — Thu, 15 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

We have another special offer for you today, and please be aware it will only be on for five days.

“Kissing a Killer” – book 4 in the Inspector Walter Darriteau series, can be bought right now for just 99 pence in the UK and 99 cents in the USA. (For the Ebook). That’s a whopping discount, around 70%.

If you are in KU –Kindle Unlimited, things are even better. All 16 books are in KU, and that means you can read the entire series for FREE, and that is a good deal in anyone’s language. (No time limit on the KU deal).

Don’t forget, if you want to pick up “Kissing a Killer” for just 0.99, you need to do that before the offer ends. It will not be on sale at this price again for two years.

Thanks for reading.

David C.

BUY HERE

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The Boys from Biloxi by John Grisham - Book Review

David Carter — Sun, 6 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Two boys meet as young friends and form a strong bond through their shared love of sports, in this case baseball and American football. On another continent, it could have been football and cricket or rugby. They are talented kids, cracking the minor leagues, but not quite good enough to make it to the big time. Inevitably, there is heartbreak ahead, as countless kids experience when they realise they won’t achieve their dreams.

Their parents know each other and nod, though are never close friends. This is a story that has been told a thousand times before about rival families and how that rivalry develops, and no doubt it will be told another thousand, though never before by the master of modern popular thriller literature, John Grisham. He always brings something new and interesting to the table, as he does here.

It’s a story of choices, the choices those boys choose, and the choices their parents make, indeed the choices we must all make when we are young, choices we have to live with forever. Which fork in the road do they take? They don’t know it, but their entire future depends on it.

Will they remain friends for life, or slowly drift apart? Will they find success in their chosen careers outside sport? Where will destiny take them, and will they remain alive to see the future?

The good news is this book was published in 2022 and a good second-hand copy can now be bought for less than a single squid, buck, or euro, whatever your preference, (plus postage) and it’s worth buying too. A chunky book running to over 450 pages of small print. I reckon that's over a 150,000 words, so ideal for the reader who enjoys the longer book, a story to last a good while, and it's worth reaching the end, because you can expect a cataclysmic finale.

“The Boys of from Biloxi” by John Grisham is a super read that will keep you entertained right up to the last page, the last sentence, and we gave it a solid 4.5 out of 5.

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Dancer by Colum McCann

David Carter — Sun, 9 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

What a terrific book this is. It tells the story of the Russian Tatar (and yes, that is spelt correctly) dancer Rudolf Nureyev. He was purportedly born on a train, rumbling down the trans-Siberian railroad, and somehow that encapsulates his wandering life.

The story opens with the boy Rudi entertaining the mentally and physically scarred troops returning from the Nazi front. His father returns too, a political officer who takes a mighty dim view of his son's chosen career path, something that dogs Rudi's progress at every turn.

Yet he is not to be denied and slowly eases his way up the greasy rungs, and he is not beyond the occasional dirty trick to help him on his way. He is quickly marked out as a rebellious character and is subsequently watched. But not carefully enough, it seems, for he defects in Paris from under the noses of KGB officers. Rudi is on his way, hurtling toward the hedonistic lifestyle of New York, London, and Paris.

Personally, I found the passages set within the Soviet Union of greater interest than those in the West. The book moved me to tears on several occasions; such is the power of Mister McCann's writing. It often comes across as a biography, but he is at pains to point out, this is a work of fiction. (Or is it Faction?) Sometimes you have to remind yourself of that, though it never once detracts from the enjoyment it offers.

The book is written in the first person and some people have found that irritating because that first person often changes with every chapter, and sometimes on every page. It is a device that keeps the reader on their toes, yet is does not hinder the writing, or the enjoyment.

It does not matter if you have little or no interest in ballet or dance, or the Soviet Union, or the Cold War, or the Sixties, or World War II, or homosexuality, for this book has the power to grip the reader whatever their interests.

I have just taken a peak at Amazon's ranking for this title. Amazingly it was 486,350! If that is true there is no justice in the world because this is the best book I have read this year. The work in hardback form can be bought for the cost of the postage alone, and that is ridiculous.

Do yourself a favour and read this book, heck, go one step further, treat yourself, and buy a copy. The book and the writer deserve it, and so do you.

5 out of 5 for me.

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Waiting by Ha Jin - Book Review

David Carter — Sat, 8 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Lin Hong, a gentleman, is a doctor, who works in the hospital in the city. He loves Manna Wu, but can’t marry her, they can’t have children, because a while ago as a young man he pleased his parents by marrying Shuyu in the rural county from which he comes. They produced a daughter, but there is little else to bind them together.

Now Lin doesn’t see his girl or his wife often. His life and future are firmly bound up in the city, with Manna Wu.

Every year he returns home to petition for divorce, but divorce in communist China is not a straightforward thing. For a start, he needs his wife’s agreement, and every year the timid Shuyu agrees before they enter court, but egged on by her manipulative brother, she changes her mind once before the magistrate.

This continues for years, eighteen long and frustrating years, during which Manna Wu will not allow her relationship with Lin to be consummated. That wouldn’t be right. People would talk; the Party would not like it. They would get into trouble. She might be banished, and there is nothing like keeping your man waiting!

Time slips by, and they are growing old.

And all this is happening to the backdrop of a China going through monumental changes, from the era of the revolutionary Red Guards when anyone with any influence in any field is fair game for mockery and abuse, and far worse. Through to the Mao Zedong era, and into a more enlightened time when once again people are permitted to dance, listen to music, start a small business, and sell things, and even, God forbid, read novels, those terrible bourgeois meaningless luxuries once outlawed, vilified and burned.

Lin is a keen reader, though he doesn’t broadcast the fact. He has his own small library, including some novels by the Russian masters, and even a poetry book by Walt Whitman. They have to be covered in brown paper, disguised from prying eyes, for discovery would not go well for Lin.

“Waiting” covers a wide period of time. The story meanders but never drags. It holds the reader from several standpoints. It is a love story, a family saga, a political lesson, a record of a country in turmoil, and most of all, a thoroughly good read. The descriptive narrative of the times are particularly evocative.

Some of the American English translation can grate on the English ear. “She dove in the water” one example, but that aside, this is a fascinating book, warm and tender, and one that I can highly recommend.

The writer, Ha Jin, is also I discover a gentlemen; whereas before I was convinced this book was written by a woman. If you are looking for something a little different, something that is easy to read with a story that will hold you from beginning to end, then Ha Jin’s "Waiting" could be just the thing for you. Check it out!

It comes as no surprise to me to see that this book has been critically acclaimed from London to Chicago and all stations in between. Well worth the time and effort spent in seeking it out.

Here are some young guys (and girls) discussing this book and I enjoyed their video too.

It was nice to get a different perspective from a different generation.

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New Inspector Walter Darriteau Book for 2025...

David Carter — Sat, 8 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Yes, we can confirm there will be an all new Inspector Walter Darriteau book for 2025, and it's quite a big one too, for those who prefer the longer read.

More on that soon, so stay tuned for further updates.

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The Diary of Jack the Ripper by Shirley Harrison - Book Review

David Carter — Fri, 7 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Jack the Ripper remains the most notorious serial killer of all time. The fact he was never caught and never identified only serves to maintain the mystery.

Here is a book that purports to reveal Jack's actual diary. According to the writer, Shirley Harrison, Jack the Ripper was, in fact, a cotton merchant from Liverpool by the name of James Maybrick. No, I am not giving away the ending. That much is revealed on the very first page. He supposedly travelled to London by train, murdered and mutilated his victims, and calmly returned home to Liverpool to torment his young wife.

James Maybrick was unquestionably an interesting man. He travelled to Norfolk, Virginia on cotton and tobacco business, and on the boat journey home, met and fell in love with an American beauty by the name of Florence Chandler. She was 18. He was 41. Lucky man!

It would appear both parties imagined the other to be far wealthier than they actually were.

Florence would become the first American woman to be tried in an English court, and as the grave charge was one of murdering her husband, it was a case that entranced the nation. This book argues the true reason for the sudden end to the Ripper killings was because Maybrick was now dead.

The mysterious diary that came to light at the end of the nineteen-eighties is reproduced almost in full. I will leave you to decide as to its authenticity. As for the book itself, I found it an interesting read, and I learned much that I did not know before. It may contain glaring anomalies, but you might like to get hold of a copy and make up your own mind.

There is a vaguely interesting personal footnote to this story.

Among the photographs in the book is a picture of Knowsley Buildings in Old Hall Street, Liverpool. This is the building where James Maybrick maintained his offices.

It was an old block with Dickensian outside metal staircases, almost a cross between a workhouse and a prison.

As a young man I knew it well for I too worked in the Liverpool Cotton Exchange a couple of doors further up Old Hall Street.

There is a photograph in the book of Knowsley Buildings and within the basement, clearly visible, is, or was, an ancient gents' hairdressing salon. I knew that well too. It was close to the original Boyle's Oyster Bar. I well remember sitting in that actual salon back in the sixties, though we called it a barbers shop back then, waiting for a trim, as a teenage office boy, clutching my newly released Sergeant Pepper album.

The salon was ancient and was dismantled when the building was knocked down in 1970. The thought occurs to me, could it have been that James Maybrick, who maintained an office just upstairs, had his locks trimmed in the same salon? He was a neat dapper chap, his photographs tells us that. It would seem likely he'd pop downstairs for a cut whenever he needed.

Perhaps I sat in the same chair as Jack the Ripper himself, as he thought and planned his most hideous business?

Now there's a thought to leave you with!

And here's another off-the-wall thought too. I have just noticed that this book was published on April 1st - All Fools' Day. (Coincidentally my birthday, I kid you not!) Could it be this entire book is, or was, one gigantic April Fool's joke? Maybe. You never know. I will leave that thought with you too. Make up your own mind.

Either way, I enjoyed the book.

It brought back memories from more than fifty years ago, and most of them were good ones too.

The Diary of Jack the Ripper

By Shirley Harrison

ISBN: 1562827049

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OP JB - The Last Great Secret of the Second World War by Christopher Creighton - Book Review

David Carter — Fri, 7 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This book purports to tell of a British intelligence plan to kidnap Martin Bormann and bring him out of the ashes of Berlin in 1945, just as the war was coming to a crashing end.

Indeed, the writer insists that this is precisely what he did, accompanied by the late Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond, after whom this operation was supposedly named.

You must forgive my scepticism, but the book is so full of amazing and extravagant claims that it makes it difficult to take anything seriously. Did James Bond even exist in 1945? I doubt that.

Mister Creighton claimed to be personal friends with Winston Churchill, Lord Louis Mountbatten, Ribbentrop the German Foreign Minister, and if that wasn't enough, you can throw in the King and good old Adolf himself, with whom he stood on the French cliffs watching allied servicemen being slaughtered during the Dieppe raid. Creighton had provided the Germans with the information of that raid to prove he was a genuine German double agent. Mmm. Sound plausible? Possibly not.

Conspiracy theories and outlandish claims abound throughout the 256 pages, such as the fact the Germans were using Donegal in Ireland as an active U-boat base, that many of the Battle of Britain pilots were only sixteen, and in some cases, fifteen, and that he personally accounted for, (murdered even?) the entire crew of an allied Dutch submarine that had spotted the Japanese fleet on their way to attack the Americans at Pearl Harbour, to ensure America came into the war.

The book opens with our Biggles-type hero diving from a British motor torpedo boat into a heavy swell, carrying an unbelievable amount of equipment and weaponry, and swimming into Dublin harbour at the dead of night. Surely any British agent entering the Irish republic would have done so by taking the ferry to Belfast and driving across the unmarked border, or better still, fly across in half in hour, and the job's done. But of course that would all be too dull, and sensible.

Included in the book are some weird quasi sexual references sprinkled throughout work, such as the WRENS, (women's royal naval service) the women officers in his unit being regularly beaten with bamboo canes on the bare buttocks in full view of the men, simply to toughen them up. Dear me!

My mother was attached to an intelligence unit in the WRENS through the war and wrote her memoirs afterwards, a book I have recently had cause to revisit. Strangely, she makes no reference to such peculiar practices. I would have loved her to have read this book, for how she would have laughed! Before firing off a letter or two!

The book climaxes with the successful kidnapping of Bormann from Berlin, (of course! What else did you expect?) as seemingly dozens of allied agents flew in and out of the decimated city on light Lysander aircraft without a care in the world, as the Red Army was smashing Berlin to smithereens.

If you enjoy conspiracy theories, and the more outlandish the better, then this is right up your street. You will be amazed at what you didn't know.

As an afterthought, the man went on to become a film director, working in Prague in the sixties when all along he was really engaged on vital work for NATO. No surprise there, then.

As proof of the story, library photographs of Bormann, Hitler, Mountbatten and Churchill are reprinted, but none feature the writer together with any of his supposed chums, not even Ian Fleming, and they were as close as close could be if this book is to be believed.

One of the most surprising things about this work is that Simon and Shuster should issue it at all, but even they did so with some reservations, stating rather shamefacedly I thought: "We have been unable to verify the writer's account by independent research." Yes, quite.

File it under fiction, treat it for what it is, and you might just enjoy it. Anything more than that, and I'd be amazed, but then again... who knows??!!

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“Doctor Fischer of Geneva or The Bomb Party” by Graham Greene – Book Review.

David Carter — Fri, 7 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Alfred Jones works for a chocolate factory in Switzerland as a translator. During the London blitz, Alfred comes across an unexploded bomb, but it didn’t remain unexploded for long, taking one of Alfred’s hands away with it. But no matter, translators don’t need two hands to earn a living.

Close to the chocolate factory is the Dentophil Bouquet toothpaste works, founded by the infamous Doctor Fischer, and the instrument that brought him great wealth, and the ability to buy a huge white mansion overlooking the lake where he lives with his beautiful daughter, and entertains his strange collection of friends.

Alfred and the daughter meet and fall in love, despite him being thirty years her senior. There may be trouble ahead, you can be sure of that.

So begins Graham Greene’s “Doctor Fischer of Geneva or The Bomb Party”.

This is not a long novel, written in 1980, not much more than a novella, but it rips along in a modern way, with crackling dialogue and characters who will remain with you long after you set it down.

In the book, Mister Greene explores the themes of human greed, lust, and I suspect his own doubts about whether exactly there is a supreme being.

I thoroughly enjoyed it and would definitely recommend it; especially if you want a short snappy read that could be read in a single weekend, if the mood took you.

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“A Legacy of Spies” by John Le Carré - Book Review.

David Carter — Fri, 7 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

I have read almost all of John Le Carré’s books and I have to admit, the ones I really liked are the older Soviet cold war stories. They simply seemed to carry so much more menace and intrigue. So you can imagine how delighted I was when this book, “A Legacy of Spies” was announced. Here’s a chance to revisit all the old characters and places and cases and victories and defeats.

Even the legendary George Smiley was supposed to be returning, so memorably played by Sir Alec Guinness in the unsurpassed BBCTV series, “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”.

And George Smiley is indeed here, though not for a good while, though he is constantly referred to, and occasionally messages are received from him, as various people, some known, some not, wonder what George might say about that, or what George might do about this, or what George might be up to, though by my reckoning he doesn’t actually appear until around page 178.

But at least he’s not dead. I had rather assumed that happened years ago!

So what’s the story about? Well, without giving any spoilers away, it harks back to an incident in the late fifties or early sixties when two people/agents/spies, (you pay your money and take your pick) were killed in a disaster, I will say no more on that, and years later, descendants sue the Service for big bucks for mishandling their relatives’ careers and deaths.

Old names are dragged up and summoned back to London and the New Forest for interviewing/questioning/interrogation (again you choose what you want to call it) - sessions conducted by young people who have little idea what the Cold War was all about because they weren’t even born when it was at its height.

I didn’t think it was an easy book to get into, but perseverance paid off. In the end the more I read the more I enjoyed it, though the writer’s rather heavy-handed interjection on how truly dreadful Brexit is wasn’t really necessary and didn’t add much.

If you have read the earlier Le Carré’s and enjoyed them then you will probably like this one too. If you haven’t read those books then you might be better starting out there, most particularly with “The Spy Who Came in From the Cold”, indeed you might even enjoy this one all the more if you read or recently re-read that one before.

Either way, A Legacy Of Spoes was a worthy effort if not exactly top notch from the late Mister Cornwell.

Aficionados will love it, newcomers may find it heavy going, and may wonder what all the fuss is about.

I’d rate it at a solid 4 stars****.

A Legacy of Spies

To buy a copy from Amazon right here right now - Click the button

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“The Judge’s List” by John Grisham – Book review.

David Carter — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Lacy Stolz specialises in investigating corrupt judges. It keeps her surprisingly busy. In a previous John Grisham book, “The Whistler”, she went too close to the fire and got burnt to the point it almost killed her. Her partner wasn’t so lucky.

But that’s all behind her now, and it’s a new year and a new day, when out of the blue, she receives a call from a mysterious woman who also takes an interest in corrupt judges.

So begins “The Judges List”, another blockbusting novel from the king of courtroom drama, John Grisham. He may have reached the milestone of seventy years of age this year (2025) though he shows not sign of slowing down, and unlike other high profile thriller writers, he is still writing his own books, leastways no one else gets a credit on any of them.

“The Judge’s List” rattles along and keeps the reader interested, though for me the ending felt a little rushed, almost as if the writer didn’t have a clear idea where it would run out of road.

But if you enjoy legal thrillers, you will find plenty here to keep you intrigued and interested.

It may not be the best JG book, but that matters not. It’s another decent read to wile away the evenings. Definitely worth a look.

Rating: A 4 out pf 5 for me.

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