Tony R Cox is an ex-provincial UK journalist. The Simon Jardine series is based on his memories of the early 70s - the time of sex, drugs and rock 'n roll - when reporters relied on word of mouth and there was no internet, no mobile phones, not even a fax machine.
Beware the ‘dreaming spires’, for Oxford, home to one of the most famous universities in the world, has a dark, threatening and, in this crime mystery: an obnoxious underbelly.
The Shivering Turn brutally undresses the façade of high blown academia; authors Sally Spencer (yes, there’s two of them) strip away the intense world of heads bent over desks and hard but encouraging tutors, and lay bare a scenario of wealth, privilege, arrogance and snobbery. Any comparisons to modern day politics are clearly and openly intended.
Schoolgirl Linda Corbet is running. She’s barefoot, injured, bleeding and she doesn’t care. She’s a frightened 17-year-old teenager. What has happened to turn this attractive, innocent girl into a ragged, scared victim?
A recently resigned police officer (who has, because it’s really all she’s trained to do and it’s what she is good at), set up a private investigation business. The word ‘business’ might be stretching it: she is financially struggling, in debt and deeply scarred by her resignation from Thames Police. Though Ex-Detective Constable Jennie Redhead however retains her principles, and she is quite prepared to turn down the fistful of cash offered to investigate the disappearance of Linda (from the girl’s distraught mother). That being said, she’s still a ‘copper at heart’ and her inquiring mind is inexorably drawn in.
The Shivering Turn describes Oxford University in details that alumni, their tutors and the ‘human paraphernalia’ that walk those halls of academia recognise.
Detective Chief Inspector (Endeavour) Morse – one of the city’s more famous ‘residents’ – would perhaps appreciate Redhead’s dogged determination; possibly less so, her hazardous methodology.
Characters in The Shivering Turn are more caricatures with their foibles and idiosyncrasies helping the plot along at an engaging pace. The frequent explanatory asides establish Oxford and its university in the reader’s mind and provide a bedrock for more ‘Jennie Redhead’ crime mysteries.
