I stumbled upon Denise Mina quite by accident, er, Amazon. I’d ordered and read a couple of Minette Walters’ mystery fiction, and trusty Amazon popped up with several recommendations, including Mina’s previous books, The Dead Hour and Field of Blood. (Okay, I succumbed to some shameless marketing. Sue me.)
This series features Paddy Meehan, Mina’s not-quite-likeable heroine who is scrabbling after a career as a newspaper writer in the uber-macho world of Glasgow. I’ve been to Glasgow, and was quite taken by its grey, grubby, hung-over, working-class charm. Nay, this isn’t your Masterpiece Theater Scotland, but it has its own energy. After some encounters with unsavory types, several high-speed chases and some brushes with death in the last book, Paddy had managed to solve the case, scoop her rivals and — SPOILER ALERT — get herself knocked up, quite a dilemma for even a not-so-good Catholic girl.
At the end of the book, I had one of those wonderful “turn-the-page-OH-NO-where’s-the-rest-of-the-story?” moments. Mina set us up but good, but my patience has paid off and I will find how she deals (or in Paddy’s case, doesn’t) with her problems.
One of the things I love about good crime and mystery fiction is how authors manage to balance the character development of their major players against the unfolding of the story. Those characters, their strengths and, better yet, their weaknesses, should add to or be revealed by that tension. Mina’s Paddy, with her messy life and stubborn will, is a great one.