Duffy Fiddle City Going To The Dogs Putting The Boot In by Dan Kavanagh

Duffy #1-4 omnibus

by Dan Kavanagh

This omnibus edition contains all four books in the series about a bisexual former cop turned private detective. "Duffy", "Fiddle City", "Going to the Dogs" and "Putting the Boot In"

Genres: Fiction

Paperback

First published November 28, 1991

About the author

Pseudonym of Julian Barnes.

Reviews

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

”What wrecked it all were two things: honesty and sex. Duffy, like most coppers, had a slightly flexible approach to the truth. You had to if you wanted to survive: not survive as a copper, but survive within yourself. The zealots who saw truth as indivisible ended up either A10 or the cuckoo farm. Most of the time you stuck to the truth as closely as you could, but were prepared to bend with the breeze if necessary. Sometimes, for instance, it might be necessary to tell a little lie, fiddle your notebook just a bit, in order to make sure that a much bigger lie didn’t get to pass itself off as the truth. On those occasions you felt bad for a bit, though you knew you didn’t have any choice in the matter.

But Duffy, like most coppers, knew that you always drew a line somewhere. You might tidy up your verbals a bit, fiddle your evidence slightly, forget a little something, but you always knew why you were doing it: you were fixing the record in favor of justice…”

Dan Kavanagh is the pen name of Julian Barnes, that prize-winning novelist we all admire so well. Here he allows his imagination to run free among the whores, bent coppers, dirty-bookshop owners, and crime lords in London’s Soho district and shows us once again his extraordinary talent. First published in 1986, this short novel (how I appreciate Barnes’ brevity once again) showcases Barnes’ sense of humor, his broad sense of inclusion, and his deep knowledge of human motivation.

This is the seedier side of London, but at no point do we feel the despair one might expect to find. Rather, a burble of laughter percolates gently through wild scenes of double-crosses and paybacks, with our bi-sexual ex-copper Duffy showing us the way.

”McKechnie rose to shake hands with Duffy. He was a bit surprised how short the security man was, but he looked quote strong. He also looked a bit of a faggot to McKechnie’s eye. He wondered about that gold stud in his ear. Was it just fashion, or was it some sort of sexual signal? McKechnie didn’t know any more. In the old days you knew precisely where you were: all the codes were worked out, you could tell who did and who didn’t, who was and who wasn’t. Even a few years ago you could still not go wildly wrong; but nowadays the only way of being quite sure who was what and who did what was when you asked your secretary to clean your glasses and she took off her knickers to do it with.”

As far as I know, Barnes only wrote four Duffy novels, all published in the 1980s. They can be purchased individually or as an Omnibus. This is a tasty treat for those who admire a well-written crime story from someone with a devilish sense of funny.

[Antoinette · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this series. Nick Duffy is an ex-cop, through no fault of his own. Now as a PI, he deals with the scrum of the earth, the very worst people. He often seems to be in over his head but he always figures out a way to bring about some kind of justice. Duffy's not a Hollywood handsome, slick detective. He's smart, clever, and greatly underestimated. There's no easy guessing where his cases are going. His cases are convoluted and interesting. There are unfortunately only four books in the series. Although Duffy is a bisexual with a "girlfriend" and has occasional male hook-ups, there's no sexual focus in these books. Trigger warning: a very upsetting child abuse scene near the end of Book 1, DUFFY.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed Julian Barnes' diversion into detective fiction. It's a shame there are only these four, I was just getting into them!

[Trish Graboske · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is a pleasure to read more by Julian Barnes, as Dan Kavanagh. These four novels are a real treat.

[Jack Heath]

Synopsis: seedy London PI, Nick Duffy is just the right man for these morally slippery cases. The four novels are from 1980 to 1987.