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Mavis Bone and the Fledgling Killer is my first novel by B P Smythe. I have been expanding my reading, trying to include more male authors and genres that stretch my imagination. This was a good pick and I hope it will interest you too.
I included the entire Goodreads blurb, because it shares the way the book was written.
The cover didn’t do a lot for me, but that’s okay. It did make me look twice and once I read the book I knew why it was chosen. Does it make you curious?
MY REVIEW
Mavis Bone and the Fledgling Killer by B P Smyther is one of those books that are hard to rate for me. The way it was written, almost like it was short stories, made it difficult to follow, yet the characters were the ones that stole the show.
Mavis Bone and Gertrude Stick live together and run a private detective agency. To say they are lesbians may distract from how twisted and damaged they really are. Is Mavis a racist and drug addict? And what about Gertrude? I took so many notes, that I think they may be a spoiler, so I tossed them aside.
I will say they are fascinating characters that walk to the beat of their own drum. Their pasts created their present, but I will leave that to you to discover. They are not my usual kind of characters, but that was the allure, to walk outside my comfort zone.
The motto of the Mavis Bone Detective Agency – An eye for an eye makes the world blind.
Is there any character that stands, morally, above the rest?
I was entertained with this twisted story and its OMG moments. It was a wild ride with quirky characters that kept me on my toes. I think Mavis Bone has something for everyone: suspense, horror, paranormal, and most of all, the outlandish characters.
I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of Mavis Bone and the Fledgling Killer by B P Smythe.
GOODREADS BLURB
The book opens with a serial killer, whose evil roots were planted from a traumatic childhood. He makes an agenda to rob and kill women for financial gain, over the years 2008 to 2014. His crime spree efforts are checked and eventually foiled by Mavis Bone, a forty-year-old Australian, lesbian, private investigator. And with her lover, forty-five-year-old German secretary, Gertrude Stick, they operate the SW19 Wimbledon Broadway based, Mavis Bone Detective Agency.
Mavis and Gertrude, live above the agency office, and share the top two flats. The walls of Mavis’s flat are adorned with pictures of Mario Lanza. Being a true fan, she has all his old records. Gertrude’s flat is full of Nazi memorabilia. In her teens she was a member of the Hitler youth.
Using a Russian motorcycle and sidecar, nicknamed Lenin, for their mode of transport, they often turn up at a crime scene, wearing hell’s angel’s leathers and Nazi helmets. Mavis’s secretary, had recently purchased the storm trooper helmets from a Nazi memorabilia website. Included with her delivery, was a giant swastika patterned bedspread, and a black satin pillow case set, all decked out with swastikas and portraits of the Nazi leaders. Through the week, Gertrude rotates the pillows, so she can take it in turn to sleep on the faces of Hitler, Goebbels and Himmler.
Chasing the `Fledgling Killer`, through his ingenious methodical killing spree, is hands on Mavis Bone, and she’s not afraid to get them dirty. This involves the death of her husband, and a problem client that could send her secretary to prison for a war crime.
Dealing with her own personal issues through the years, Mavis has blood on her hands and sees it justifiable, even though the police wouldn’t. Her gender choices, along with her racist opinionated views, were moulded in her hard-Australian outback childhood, and were the motivation for killing her prostitute philandering husband.
Mavis Bone is a real believable Ozzy crude character, who has a preference for strap-on lesbian sex and snorting Charlie – a cocaine habit she picked up in Columbia as a student, while backpacking around South America during her early twenties
Mavis and Gertrude are lovers, and share a bond of tortured childhoods. They suffer each other, and are comparable to Holmes and Watson in their crime fighting gay relationship; while using sound racist logical reasoning and drug taking, to solve crimes.
Mavis Bone explained:
With my book, `Mavis Bone and the Fledgling Killer`, I hope to transform the standard thriller genre. This is achieved by using chapter heading teasers that unveil a narrative with a diverging short story structure; weaving its way through a series of connecting subplots. Subplots which are paced with peaks and troughs, through a series of scene and sequels. While never forgetting what’s at stake, through its chapter driven storyline.
The novel explores in detail, Mavis Bone as a fictional lesbian detective, who is on the outside of the margins of society, while trying to achieve justice and generate change.
Mavis Bone is sexualized, condescended to, and used as a pawn. And yet, when her body trembles, her gaze never wavers.
Her life story is a blueprint, peppered with the ugly elements of Homophobia.
The book fits into our obsession with serial killers, and our interest in their pathology, along with the suffering of their victims.
Its story telling, bridges rites of passage and transformation, to create a book of terror, but not with gratuitous racism, sex or violence. A book in which, being different, is challenged, forcing us to look twice before judging another human being, whether they be a criminal, psychopath or plain mad.
A book in which the human drama supersedes, and propels the plot, instead of falling victim to it.
Mavis Bone’s emotions and fears, are described vividly, and the book is full of penetrating insights into her human condition, that go way beyond her sexual appetite.
The moral of the story, is meant to provoke readers to see life differently, and make them understand LGBT life styles – as well as gender inequality and the inevitable discrimination, as seen through the eyes of Mavis Bone’s early sexual experiences.
With this novel, I hope to achieve reader empathy – showing and creating the plotted life story of Mavis Bone. This is while inviting the reader to peek behind her intimate torrid life. Similar to a voyeur inviting the viewer to peek behind drawn blinds and through the window. And finally, drawing the reader into the psychological aftermath, revealing how killing and sexual urges can fester and go sour, when suppressed for too long.
ABOUT BARRY SMYTHE
B.P.Smythe studied engineering at Carshalton College and eventually became a member of the Institute of Quality Assurance.
Sow And You Shall Reap – http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/145677171X is his first self- published novel. Last year B.P. secured a three book deal of short stories from Bloodhound Books http://www.bloodhoundbooks.com/. His author bio is on their website.
From a Poison Pen is his first book of short stories http://www.amazon.co.uk/Poison-Pen-collection-macabre-stories-ebook/dp/B01BKWT4EE. His second book of short stories From a Poison Pen VOL II has just been released and is available on: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Poison-Pen-ii-B-P-Smythe-ebook/dp/B01LFM1032
This year 2017, B.P.Smythe is shortly to release two full length novels – The Medal of Purity and The Expired including two further books of short stories – Short Tales with Long Memories VOL 1 and VOL 2 and a novella – The Holocaust Experience.
Books by B.P.Smythe: For information on obtaining free complimentary PDF, Kindle or paperback copies, contact B.P.Smythe at barrysmythe@hotmail.com
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I don’t like the cover, personally, it’s too loud and kinda hurts to stare at too long but it did make me look twice. But I will say the book sounds good!