Blood Red City

In his fourth novel, Rod Reynolds has perfectly captured the invigorating mix of aspiration and survival that makes up London’s atmosphere. He plunges the reader deep into the experience of metropolitan life, during a recent past that seems, while I write in Covid lockdown, like a half-remembered dream. To paraphrase its powerful opening chapter, Blood Red City lays London bare, highlighting the ever-growing contrast between glittering skyscrapers and hulking tower blocks. Of course, human nature being what it is, each of these environments harbours a similar level of greed and cruelty. Some characters migrate between the competing territories. Others inhabit a shady underworld between them, carving out an existence by means legal, illegal, or both. It is within this no-man’s-land that Lydia Wright and Michael Stringer operate.

When crusading journalist Lydia Wright is sent a video of an apparent murder on a London train, she thinks she's found the story to revive her career. But she can't find a victim, much less the killers, and the only witness has disappeared. Wary she's fallen for fake news, she begins to doubt her instincts - until a sinister call suggests that she's not the only one interested in the crime.

Lydia was flying high until she chose the wrong colleague to back in a power wrangle. Demoted to cover celebrity gossip, she works the graveyard shift for ‘one of the country’s leading media organisations’.Young and ambitious, she is frustrated by a sideways career move that maintains her comfortable lifestyle but derails her journalistic ambitions. When the story opens, Lydia is teetering on the verge of professional despair, and the chance to investigate a murder is the straw she grasps.

Michael Stringer deals in information - and he doesn't care what side of the law he finds himself on. But the murder on the train has left him exposed, and now he'll stop at nothing to discover what Lydia knows.

I found Michael fascinating. A callous loner, manipulating his victims with heartless efficiency, at the beginning he comes across as totally repellent. Subsequently, Reynolds unpicks Michael’s back story, rounding out his personality and illuminating his past. Nevertheless, even as the reader begins to comprehend Michael’s life choices, it becomes clear that he is not a character for whom one should feel much sympathy, or trust completely. Like the rogue financial underworld he inhabits, when push comes to shove, Michael Stringer will always follow the money.

When their paths collide, Lydia finds the story leads through a nightmare world, where money, power and politics intersect ... and information is the only thing more dangerous than a bullet.…

The intricate plot of Blood Red City is expertly planned and satisfyingly developed. As the story unfolds, the personal lives of Lydia and Michael are explored with imagination and insight. Significant events occur in a variety of locations, each of them perceptively described, illustrating the huge differences in wealth and opportunity between different London communities. All of this happens at breakneck pace and, to a great extent, digitally. Although the book contains some scenes of terrifying physical violence, and others that will touch the reader’s heart, the main action is driven by interaction on mobile technology and social media platforms. Rod Reynolds has a background in advertising and media, and this is strongly reflected in his writing.

What did I like about this book?

As someone who lives and works in London, I enjoyed the convincing and vividly described locations.

What would I change?

For me, figuring out exactly what Lydia and Michael were getting up to on Facebook slowed the pace down a bit. However, the exercise has done my limited techno skills the world of good. Note to self: must keep up.

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