By Natalie Marlow @NatalieMarlow2
Published by Baskerville (an imprint of John Murray Press) https://www.johnmurraypress.co.uk/landing-page/baskerville-imprint/ @BaskervilleJMP
336 pages ISBN 9781399801799
Publication date 19 January 2023
I was allowed access to a pdf review copy on Net Galley. Thanks to the Author and Publisher for organising this.
From the blurb
Birmingham, 1933.
Private enquiry agent William Garrett, a man damaged by a dark childhood spent on Birmingham’s canals, specialises in facilitating divorces for the city’s male elite. With the help of his best friend – charming, out-of-work actor Ronnie Edgerton – William sets up honey traps. But photographing unsuspecting women in flagrante plagues his conscience and William heaves up his guts with remorse after every job.
However, William’s life changes when he accidentally meets the beautiful Clara Morton and falls in love. Little does he know she is the wife of a client – a leading fascist with a dangerous obsession. And what should have been another straightforward job turns into something far more deadly.
My thoughts
Needless Alley is a homage to the golden era of crime fiction encompassing quintessential Englishness married with a touch of the US hard-boiled. Its outlook is more modern though and touches on themes such as the personal damage of war, misogyny, and pornography, not the staples of the novels of the period. This adds a nice dark and seedy touch to the period without getting down to the dregs of society of the Berlin of the period as inhabited by Bernie Gunther. The pornographer is typically a grubby fat man, driven by greed but one who has been an artistic photographer, so his tableaux are tastefully posed.
1930’s Birmingham is convincingly evoked, not that I am over familiar with the city, grimy, dangerous, and unforgiving for the stranger, as good a backdrop for period noir as LA. I particularly liked inclusion of life on the canal basin, as is often quoted Birmingham has more miles of canal than Venice, but that is where the similarity ends. Most industrial cities had their slums, with the exploited inhabitants battling for their existence with fortitude and this is brought to life. They were not without humour though and there is a nice vein of dark course humour running through the prose, in keeping with the period and setting.
The novel comprises two parts which might be thought of as realisation and retribution. The first part is quite gentle as we learn about William and Ronnie and their sordid business plan. As it develops William starts to reassess his life and has a blossoming love affair. The second part, without giving too much away, is much darker as William now finds his focus to become a real Private Investigator and with Phyll as an unlikely ally come sidekick, in search of answers and retribution. Here the storyline builds up a momentum of its own with a real sense of urgency, some violence, deceptions, and a couple of surprises. The plot is cleverly crafted and can be summarised by the New Order album title “power, corruption and lies.”
It is the characters that really bring the story to life and capture the readers imagination. I for one am looking forward to the next book in the series.
William is the hero who has an almost Damascene revelation that what he is doing is wrong. Every case he and Ronnie succeed with destroys the reputation and life of the woman involved. This was a time where life was stacked against women (you may argue it still is) with limited rights and divorce laws favouring the husband. He bears the mental scars of war and comes to realise that he will not find happiness and love living the way he is and so becomes a man looking for redemption.
Ronnie is the book reviewers dream, a chance to blow the dust of Roget’s Thesaurus and find the perfect words to describe him. Ronnie is still an attractive man, a little fey and living a bohemian life, like a streetwise Oscar Wilde but with a deep libertine streak. This could be down to the effects of war, but more likely his desire for money without honest toil. The fact he can rub shoulders with canal boatmen and drink in their pubs is beguiling if a little unlikely. At heart he is a damaged man with a nihilistic streak.
Queenie is the strong matronly figure even though she is not the eldest of the three. She’s calm and pragmatic with a survive at all costs attitude which gives her a hard carapace to face the world. Her business dealings include criminal activities but there’s some goodness at heart as she cares for those close to her. A tough woman doing what she needs to survive in a hard man’s world. (I thought yes, this kind of woman had to be Queenie or Duchess, then lo and behold in my next read there is a Duchess!)
The one that caught my imagination was Phyll, who William at first believes is a young boy. He later discovers that she is a bright intelligent young woman with a penchant for men’s clothing and an eye for good tailoring. Another survivor and a bit of a fish out of water with the norms of the day. I do hope we see more from Phyll in any follow up novels.
Needless Alley is an engrossing historical noir with engaging characters an intense plot and a few surprises for the reader.
Needless Alley can be purchased via the publishers website here
The author
Natalie Marlow is an historical novelist with a fascination for the people and landscapes of the Midlands. Much of her writing takes inspiration from the stories her grandparents told. She holds an MA in Creative Writing (Crime Writing) from the University of East Anglia and is part-way through a PhD at Birkbeck, University of London. She lives in Warwickshire with her family. (Source: Publisher’s website)
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