by Ian Todd
Dumfries is a dark, often violent, chiller-thriller, that will have followers of The Mankys drawing their curtains and locking their doors, before reaching for the book, as they try to anticipate who will do what to who next. You have been warned.
The Silver Arrow is the seventh book in The Glasgow Chronicles series and is also available on Amazon:
The Silver Arrow is Ian Todd's 7th book and continues on from Dumfries in The Glasgow Chronicles series of books.
Whilst the residents of 1970s Glasgow are captivated by the antics of a mystery driver, who they’ve nicknamed The Silver Arrow, being pursued by police along Great Western Road in his 1930s sports car in the dead of night at weekends, a far more dangerous game of cat-and-mouse is being played out on the streets, below the radar of both the local police and Wan-bob Broon, Glasgow’s number one gangster.
After visiting Johnboy Taylor, Scotland’s longest-serving young offender, in Dumfries Young Offenders Institution, Nurse Senga Jackson heads back to Glasgow, unaware of the mortal danger that she and her flatmate, Lizzie Mathieson are in after Lizzie unwittingly overhears the deathbed confession of a dying gangster to Inspector Paddy ‘The Stalker’ McPhee, who has threatened to expose the sordid sex-life of the doctor on duty, in order to access the intensive care unit of Stobhill General Hospital in the middle of the night.
With half of The Mankys, Glasgow’s most up and coming young criminal gang, serving time in Dumfries, including their charismatic leader, Tony Gucci, responsibility for the safety of Senga Jackson and her flatmate is placed in the hands of nineteen-year-old Simon Epstein, a young entrepreneur from Springburn, who operates Carpet Capers Warehouse in the Cowcaddens district of the city.
Despite the odds being stacked against The Mankys and the two young nurses, Simon joins up with one of Glasgow’s top criminal legal teams in the battle to secure the evidence that could prove that Johnboy Taylor is innocent of shooting two police officers in a bank robbery in Maryhill. At the same time, Simon continues to duck and dive behind the neon lights of the dirty city, in a desperate attempt to keep the two girls alive.
The Silver Arrow is an often-violent thriller, though not without humour, with a high-speed plot that takes more twists, turns and risks than a speeding classic racing car in the night, consistently out-witting and out-manoeuvring its pursuers. The key question being debated amongst The Mankys incarcerated in Dumfries YOI is whether Simon Epstein can keep in pole-position until Tony Gucci can join him in the race against time, even though he doesn’t know who will strike when, where or at whom.
Elvis The Sani Man is the eighth book in The Glasgow Chronicles series and is also available on Amazon:
It is 1975 and Elvis Presley, head of Glasgow Corporation's sanitation food inspectors for the north of the city, is busy preparing for the Scottish final of the 'Elvis Is The Main Man Event’ at The Plaza Ballroom at Eglinton Toll.
When Elvis is not dreaming of stardom, he and his unlikely new partner, WPC Collette James, are hot on the trail of Black Pat McVeigh, the Mr Big of the city's black meat trade, who is based up in Possilpark in the north of the city.
Pushing Elvis to do something about the plight of her constituents, who are being poisoned left, right and centre by one of the city's most notorious 'black butcher’ gangs, is Corporation Councillor for Springburn, Barbara Allan.
Unbeknown to the authorities, Barbara Allan is also the mysterious and elusive ‘Purple Dove,’ leader of a secretive underground group of women in the city, who call themselves 'The Showgirls.'
Whilst struggling to bring the city’s diverse women’s groups together to stand as one, the campaign of taking direct action by The Showgirls continues to publicly ‘out’ senior male managers in businesses, hospitals and The Corporation who sexually harass female employees, by daubing graffiti and photographs of the guilty up on to the advertisement billboards that are scattered across the city.
Meanwhile, the close friends and supporters of Helen Taylor, having set up their own catering business for funerals and weddings, soon fall foul of Elvis The Sani Man and the law, when over a hundred guests fall ill after being served up Springburn’s Larder’s exotic menu.
Never far away from this mental mix, The Mankys, one of Glasgow’s young up-and-coming ‘organised’ gangs, continue on their merry way of mixing business and pleasure, whilst bank-rolling the campaign group that will hopefully lead to one of their members, Johnboy Taylor, having his wrongful conviction of shooting two police officers during a bank robbery in Maryhill back in November 1972 overturned.
Elvis - The Sani Man, is a dark, dangerous and often violent journey through the murky streets of Glasgow and is interspersed with black humour, whilst introducing the reader to Glasgow's illicit underworld of back-street meat traders in the mid-nineteen-seventies.
Ian Todd once again reacquaints the reader with some familiar faces from previous Glasgow Chronicles books, whilst introducing a whole new batch of the craziest and wackiest characters that were ever launched out of the Rottenrow delivery room back in the day.
One Hundred And Twelve Days is the ninth book in The Glasgow Chronicles series and is also available on Amazon:
Two gangsters and three police officers appear in court and are placed on remand to Glasgow’s grim Barlinnie Prison for one hundred and twelve days. All have been charged with various crimes, including corruption and murder.
It isn’t long before well-known gangsters start to turn up dead, whilst others suddenly disappear into thin air.
Elsewhere in the city, off the radar, an off-duty police inspector has been charged with the suspicious death of his wife, in what the authorities believe is just another domestic dispute that took a tragic turn. But was it murder?
Meanwhile, a small group of senior police officers have been meeting to prevent developments spiralling out of control, whilst they try to figure out exactly what’s going on.
Across the city, those in the know, including The Mankys, are either running for cover or sitting waiting, deciding if the time is right to make a move.
Ian Todd’s latest novel, One Hundred And Twelve Days, is a gritty crime thriller, set in Glasgow in 1975 and follows on from his previous eight books in The Glasgow Chronicle series, in this violent, dark tale of power and corruption, on the streets of the mankiest city of the empire.
Kingston Bridge is the tenth book in The Glasgow Chronicles series and is also available on Amazon:
With only a month to go before two of the most controversial murder trials in living memory begin at Glasgow's grim High Court, down in the Saltmarket, Wan-bob Broon continues to spin his dangerous spider's web across the city from his cell in Barlinnie Prison, in an attempt to influence and control the verdicts.
The question on the lips of those in the know is whether Wan-bob Broon is the only shark that's entered the murky waters amongst the shadows of the River Clyde, which snakes its way between the territories of two of Glasgow's most feared organised gangs.
As chaos reigns within the city’s police force and revelations explode from the typewriter of Glasgow's newest award-winning young journalist, Pearl Campbell, the race is on between the underworld, the police and the procurator fiscal's service, to see who can control and influence her for their own ends.
Meanwhile, The Mankys, one of the up-and-coming wee criminal teams in the toon, are desperately searching to find a way of keeping their heads down and intact, whilst they plan a comeback on those responsible for wiping out two of their members. However, like everything else in the mankiest city of the empire, things don't always work out the way they want them to.
If dodgy crackpot characters and the art of the double cross are up your street, then Ian Todd's new street thriller, Kingston Bridge, is sure to whet your appetite and more.
Ledmore Junction is the eleventh book in The Glasgow Chronicles series and is also available on Amazon:
A young couple escape Glasgow to start a new life on a remote croft in beautiful North Wes
t Sutherland in the Scottish Highlands. One is a district nurse and the other a budding author, attempting to reinvent themselves amongst the stunning scenery of Achmelvich Beach and Vestey’s Bay.
In their wake, the police in the second city of the empire are still trying to come to terms with the carnage of gangland violence that suddenly spiralled out of control after two of Glasgow’s most notorious gangsters, were assassinated eating breakfast in one of the city’s cafes.
Whilst the couple settle into their idyllic paradise, it’s not long before strange, unexplained events start to occur that leads Johnboy Taylor to suspect that they may be being targeted.
Everything seemed to be going to plan, until a strange bird of omen appears out of nowhere and takes up residence on their shed roof. Senga Jackson believes that it’s the same bird that has been following her around the remote district as she attends to her patients.
Whilst Johnboy suspects he has the answer to the bird’s sudden appearance, life at Little Vestey’s Croft starts to become complicated and relations strained, as the impending showdown between two unholy factions looms, threatening a love that has endured many turbulent trials and tribulations in the past.
Ian Todd’s latest novel in The Glasgow Chronicles series once again brings together a mad mix of past and present antagonists that threaten to break apart a young couple in search of paradise. Is this a new beginning for them or the end of a beautiful relationship?
