Before I get into Mr Connolly’s latest Charlie Parker offering I must confess that I’m no literary graduate, so I probably lack the academic skills to do justice to how I feel about this latest instalment in the series, and the series as a whole, but as with most of life, I’ll wing it and see how I go.

Somehow despite the length of the Parker series it never loses its intensity or appeal.  I know I’m biased as I’ve been hooked ever since Every Dead Thing and like Thomas Harris’ The Tooth Fairy, remain an avid fan, but what struck me from the outset of The Children of Eve, is the old wedding adage of something old something new.  The ‘old’ being the characters themselves and the ‘new’ being the latest direction Parker’s quarry takes us, this time to Mexico and the illegal antiquities trade.

Another feat The Children of Eve accomplishes is the addition of two new nemeses in the form of La Senora and Eugene Seeley, to be added to a long list of incredible counterparts.  Maybe it’s some corrupt aspect of my soul but I particularly enjoy a really well thought out foe, one who isn’t completely damned to allow you to root for them a little.  Not Mr Pudd, he was and always will be cannon fodder in my eyes, but what I really love is the ones like Seeley, The Collector and even Quayle, who all have a unique code that makes them interesting enough to secretly hope they stick around for a little while, if just to agitate Parker and annoy Louis.

I won’t give away any spoilers as I detest the internet for that but it’s safe to say you won’t be disappointed as it’s rare to find any book, let alone a series, that combine action, suspense, and a supernatural element all whilst underpinned by a rare poignancy that sits with you long after the last page is turned.

Hopefully it won’t come as too much of a shock to divulge that one of my recently acquired anxiety silencers is going through favourite books and noting out quotes and lines that resonate – I find it particularly soothing and as you may have guessed, I’ve started with John Connolly.  One of my favourites from The Children of Eve is:

In the marshes, in the moonlight, Jennifer Parker listened.  The children were calling out again, the same words repeated like an incantation or a summoning, howling like animals desperate to be found.

No, not that alone, she thought.

Desperate to be reunited.

Some others that I have picked from the series I’ll share below and leave it to Parker fans to correctly ascribe them:

At my feet, a trapdoor stood open.  It was made of heavy oak bound with iron, and below it a flight of stone steps led into a patch of bright yellow light.  I had found the entrance to the honeycomb world.

All was coming apart around me, and I did not know what to do, so I sat instead among snow and ice on a rotted tree trunk, and willed clocks to stop.

And so we fell like stars, and at the moment of impact I wrapped the tattered remnants of charred black wings around me, and the fires went out at last.

He rises, removes his cap, and offers a prayer, because he cannot think of what else to do for her.  For this young woman in an old land, waiting to be found.

Not quite as demanding as a cryptic crossword in The Times which Mr Quayle would attest to, but sufficiently satisfying nonetheless.