Not Dead Enough, the third of Peter’s books to be translated to stage, is currently touring the UK to critical acclaim, starring Shane Ritchie as Roy Grace and Laura Whitmore as Cleo Morey. I like in the book that he is very aware of the mental state of his workforce and his concern for their general well being is paramount to him. While Grace awaits further developments, his own domestic drama continues apace with the burial of his first wife, Sandy, a train wreck of a woman who ran off a decade ago to a secret life in Germany, and his own trip to Munich to pick up Bruno, the 10-year-old he unwittingly fathered but has never met, and bring him back to his own home. I'd been told by a friend and Peter James fan to delve into another of his novels as the former was not his best work.

The original run was followed by the play of Dead Simple in 2015, starring Tina Hobley and Jamie Lomas which was an equally big success during its 6-month nationwide run. She leaves behind no memories worth keeping: her husband is dead, her boss has made no bones about disliking her, and she’s looking forward to new responsibilities and the higher salary underwritten by North Dakota’s sudden oil boom. I'm struggling to provide more detail without spoiling things for readers who haven't read the previous books in the series so I'll move on.

Then other scenarios begin to present themselves, each of them tantalisingly plausible, until, in a sudden turn of events, and to his utter disbelief, the case turns more sinister than Grace could ever have imagined. Grace and his new wife Cleo have a fledgling relationship, with Grace conscious that his work does not come between them both. James strikes a good balance between the professional and personal sides of Roy Grace's life, each enhancing the other. Overall it was a decent read and I really did enjoy it, but maybe at the cost of areas that were normally more enjoyable.

A week after the night she chases but fails to catch a mysterious trespasser outside her town house, some unknown party texts Tempe four images of a corpse that looks as if it’s been chewed by wild hogs, because it has been. I am so pleased to have followed the advice of a Peter James fan and read a novel from the Roy Grace series. I've been looking forward to my next Roy Grace 'fix' and in Need You Dead, Peter James delivers another blistering story in a series that's maintained momentum. As popular internationally as in the UK, he won the US Barry Award, for Best British Crime Novel in 2012.From the off Roy seems a little unbalanced, however it totally makes sense as he is just getting closure after the death of Sandy his wife who disappeared many years before. There is the very human story of Roy Grace being united for the first time with his son, while at the same time there is the horrific discovery of a woman’s body. Wow it’s been a while since I read a Roy Grace book and here we are again still my favourite detective series on and off screen. Need you Dead is a straight-up, no nonsense police procedural with all that is expected from this genre.