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Inspector Banks #16

by Peter Robinson

Rockfestivalen i Brimsleigh Woods sommaren 1969 är årets höjd punkt. Biljettförsäljningen slår rekord, massor med kända artister finns på plats och stämningen är på topp. Men slutet blir desto mörkare: i en sovsäck hittas liket av den unga Linda Lofthouse, brutalt knivhuggen till döds.

Kommissarie Stanley Chadwick har själv en dotter i samma ålder och får i uppgift att utreda mordet. Han blir närmast besatt av att hitta den skyldige. Trots folks ovilja att vittna och knapphändiga bevis lyckas han till slut gripa en man som döms för brottet.

Tjugofem år senare undersöker kriminalkommissarie Alan Banks mordet på en musikjournalist. Dennes anteckningar avslöjar att han höll på med en artikelserie om ett av banden som spelade i Brimleigh Woods. Och snart blir kopplingarna till fallet Linda Lofthouse alltmer tydliga.

Genres: Mystery, Crime, Fiction, British Literature, Thriller, Mystery Thriller, Procedural

436 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Peter Robinson was born in Yorkshire. After getting his BA Honours Degree in English Literature at the University of Leeds, he came to Canada and took his MA in English and Creative Writing at the University of Windsor, with Joyce Carol Oates as his tutor, then a PhD in English at York University. He has taught at a number of Toronto community colleges and universities and served as Writer-in-Residence at the University of Windsor, 1992-93.

Series:
* Inspector Banks

Awards:
* Winner of the 1992 Ellis Award for Best Novel.
* Winner of the 1997 Ellis Award for Best Novel.
* Winner of the 2000 Anthony Award for Best Novel.
* Winner of the 2000 Barry Award for Best Novel.
* Winner of the 2001 Ellis Award for Best Novel.

Reviews

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here is another strong entry (number 16) in the Peter Robinson's DCI Banks series. This time we have two time periods (1969 & 2006) & two murders to solve. Robinson's dual time periods worked well in his novel In A Dry Season & they do again this time around.
The author builds up a good picture of 1960's life & there are plenty of wonderful music references, including one for my favourite band Jethro Tull!
This may be one of the author's longest novels, but there's not a word wasted & Robinson once again proves he's one of the best crime writers around.

[Melanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars. I enjoyed this book. It has 2 storylines, one taking place in 1969 and one in the present day. The 1969 story is about a young woman murdered at a music festival. The present day story is about the murder of a young journalist. This is not a gory/bloody type of mystery, more of a realistic crime solving tale. I enjoyed the musical references in the 1969 storyline. I am a huge fan of the music from the time period (it is my listening preference). I was not sure how the story was going to play out until the author revealed it at the end. This is the first book I've read in this series. I have another installment waiting on my shelves and I look forward to it.

[Ian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Piece Of My Heart is my third Robinson/Banks read and likely to be my last.
There's nothing objectionable about either the writing or the story, but I feel I've done Banks now, and there's nothing else to gain.
Dovetailing two separate murder cases separated by forty years but with much in common is smart but the author had to work really hard on holding the connections at bay, sometimes too hard, and whilst there is a minor twist in the tail it's not an especially satisfying one.
Robinson presents us with endless sex, drugs and rock 'n roll cliches of the Sixties, and takes the notion that 'if you remember it you weren't there' far too seriously, even giving us the dead rock star in a swimming pool as a centre piece.
Running the two stories in parallel renders this 540 plus pages book a good 150 pages too long with considerable amounts of tedious filler which includes passages with a token Mirrenesque (DCI Tennyson) boss which adds nothing to the story. It's not without some merit as a police procedural, but I would only recommend Piece Of My Heart as a lazy, easy going holiday read.

[David Highton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another strong police procedural, covering two differemt murders 35 years apart and told seperately for the first 70% of the books until Banks makes the linkage secure. The usual good writing that characterises this series. Much better than the TV adaptation.

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Piece of my Heart (Inspector Banks, #16) by Peter Robinson.

This was a balancing of two time periods. that of 1969 (the age of psychedelic music and LSD) and 2005 present day in the life of DCI Banks. P.R. is one of the few authors that I know of who was able to write an exceptionally excellent story of these years and the murders involved. Banks went after the reasoning behind there being a link between these murders.
I can't recommend this book enough. Riveting and focused on Banks following clues that no one else was aware of.

[Tina Culbertson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is book #16 in Peter Robinson’s DCI Banks series. It starts in 1969 with Detective Inspector Stanley Chadwick investigating the murder of a young woman. She was found on a deserted field after the conclusion of a rock festival, stabbed so viciously a piece of her heart was sliced off.

I read several pages before thinking I may have picked up one of Robinson’s books that wasn’t in the DCI Banks series. But knowing the series is written in real time and Banks’ gets older, to set one in 1969 would be unusual.

After several pages in the first chapter I noted a different date and year (2005) at the top of a chapter. Finally Alan Banks’ story begins. He is investigating the murder of a music journalist Nick Barber in the Yorkshire dales.

If you note the date at the top of the chapters you won’t be confused. The book has this format to the end, switching between the two different time periods, but Robinson deftly threads both story lines of these two cases. It was interesting to read about the bands from 1969 and I certainly recognized my favorite – Pink Floyd. Imagine being able to see them with multiple events in their early years. (I was able to see a concert of theirs in Miami in the 1970s)

In the 1969 story, DI Chadwick has to eliminate thousands of people at a concert to discover the killer. Further complications come with his conflict of interest between his 16 year old daughter who is involved with hippies and drugs that overlap into his investigation. The descriptions of people, music, the “free love era” and attitudes are aptly described.

In 2005 DCI Banks and Annie Cabbot have their own full scaled investigation of Nick Barber (the music journalist). It appears there is a link between the band Mad Hatters from 1969 festival and the recent murder. Leaving no stone unturned Banks doggedly pursues clues from present day to the current events and Barber’s murder.

I was pleased to see DC Winsome Jackman get more page time in this book and hope to see more of her in the future. I still have 7 books to catch up to Robinson’s most current book, When The Music’s Over.

[Chomsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Robinson è autore molto noto in Gran Bretagna, molto meno in Italia, dove questo romanzo incongruamente intitolato "Black dog" è uno dei pochi tradotti nella nostra lingua.
Le indagini sull'omicidio di una ragazza durante uno dei primi festival rock nel 1969 e sulla morte di un giornalista specializzato in musica si dipanano su due piani paralleli prima di trovare una convergenza inaspettata causata dalla perseveranza dell'ispettore Banks che non crede alle coincidenze e rilegge le vecchia indagine con occhi nuovi per trovare tracce non viste oppure occultate in passato.
Il romanzo ha un notevole sottofondo musicale essendo ambientato in parte durante l'epoca d'oro del rock con le band che nascevano e morivano in breve tempo. La band al centro dell'attenzione è la fittizia "The Mad Hatters" ma ci sono tanti e continui riferimenti ai gruppi più celebri che danno un valore aggiunto al plot giallo.
Non capisco però il titolo italiano "Black dog" che chiaramente cita un famoso brano dei Led Zeppelin, che anche loro stanno sullo sfondo della vicenda, ma che non ha nessun appiglio logico mentre il titolo originale "Piece of My Heart" ricorda un clamoroso successo di Janis Joplin.
Se non conoscete Peter Robinson forse è il caso di colmare questa lacuna magari cominciando da questo giallo che è il sedicesimo di una lunga serie cominciata nel 1987 con "Gallows View" e per ora chiusa da "Careless Love" del 2018, venticinquesimo episodio della saga dell'ispettore Banks a cui la BBC ha dedicato anche la serie televisiva "DCI Banks".

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

By the time the connection between the past and present cases is revealed, it's not very much of a surprise, particularly for genre fans. The insight into the backstage world of musicians is intriguing, but my overall enjoyment is marred somewhat (as it has been more than once with Robinson) by the persistent naivete of his female characters. For someone as cool as Banks, I'd expect the women in his world to be somewhat more with it.

[Pete Loveday · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read that is a great bargain - two gripping stories in the one manuscript! How good is that!
Once again Chief Inspector Banks rolls into a deep mystery that has a similarity to a murder scene of 4 decades earlier. Despite 'Dagwood', Banks overcomes the odds and gives us a suspenseful thriller with a wicked twist.

[Jack Heath · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 Stars. It's a back and forth mystery. We follow the police investigations of two murders separated by 4 decades and without any obvious connections - the first occurs at a 1969 rock festival featuring Led Zeppelin, and the second concerns investigative reporter Nick Baxter bludgeoned to death; he was doing a current-day story on the Mad Hatters who performed at that years-ago festival. Different sets of officers with different skill levels with the man leading the 2009 investigation being Inspector Banks, one of my favourites. It's a very good one although a bit long. You just know that there must be a connection between the cases, but what is it? Say no more Jack! A young woman attending the music festival in the late 60s was found stabbed to death in her sleeping bag. No witnesses, and few clues. The scene was all booze and drugs, rock 'n roll and sex. Finding a coherent participant was difficult! Years later, a reporter, that's Baxter, believes he has found a new clue to the young woman's death. But then he gets killed. He must have found something. You'll enjoy Banks doing his best to work with his new and very demanding, female Superintendent. (Mar2025)

[Vicky Sp · Rating 3 out of 5]

Due indagini parallele a differenza di trent'anni, della due storie che si intrecciano e svelano un volto inedito della generazione che proclamava pace e amore

[Jane · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm a fan of Robinson's Inspector Banks series, set in Yorkshire. I've just finished the 16th, Piece of My Heart.

There are two intertwined narratives. In one, Banks and his partner, DC Annie Cabot, investigate the 2005 murder of music journalist Nick Barber. In the other, set in 1969, DI Chadwick looks for the killer of a young woman who was stabbed, after midnight, at an outdoor music festival. Banks is convinced that the two cases are connected, and how they're connected is the primary mystery.

Banks and Cabot thoroughly and methodically research their case and solve it. There's professionalism but no drive here, not on Banks's part, and not on Robinson's.

In some of my favorite installments of the Banks series, the inspector gets personally invested in what he discovers about the victim and in the search for the perpetrator. Not so much here. So, neither did I.

[Alison S ☯️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read all of the Inspector Banks series, bar two, and this is one of my favourites. Quality writing, plotting, settings and characters. I particularly like the way this story alternates between the solving of a crime in the past and in the present day.

[Karen Brooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

This engrossing novel commences in 1969, when a lovely young, free-spirited woman is found dead in a sleeping bag after a huge music concert and the suspects range from concert attendees to the musicians themselves.

Fast forward to the Twenty-First Century and Banks is called to investigate the quite brutal murder of a music journalist, Nick Barber, in a small village. Not only is the motive for his death unclear, so are the reasons for Barber's presence in an unremarkable part of the UK. The list of suspects slowly grows but is unsatisfactory as while there are motives for murder, they aren't really enough to sustain a murder charge. Puzzled and intrigued, Banks knows there is a mystery attached to this man and his death, a feeling confirmed when a page of numbers, some circled, is found scrawled in the back of a novel Barber purchased. But what do they mean? Are they even important?

Segueing between 1969, the era of free love, hippies and counter-culture and current times, two unrelated crimes, two different types of investigations, are explored and the plot literally thickens. The further Banks is drawn into the sometimes seedy world of famous rock stars, the more perplexing the case becomes but it's not until Banks and his team begin to look into the past that not only do answers begin to emerge, but painful memories that some will do anything to repress also erupt...

This is a terrific Banks installment. Not only does Robinson evocatively explore the late 60s with musical references, clothing, ideology, living conditions and generational differences through the older case, in both the past and present he manages to intertwine the personal and professional imbuing the novel with layers that are at once exciting and touching. Add to that Banks and Annie Cabot dealing with an ambitious boss, and Winsome with an unpleasant sycophantic peer and the story fires on so many levels.

Intricately plotted, it's evident that Robinson painstakingly researched this book to give accurate dates and times for which to connect his fictitious scenarios with real world events, giving the story additional verisimilitude. It is also fascinating to contrast the policing styles of the late 60s and the science available to that of present times. Also compared are two fathers who raise/are raising children within different social and cultural contexts and the challenges they face understanding and relating to their kids.

Thoroughly enjoyed this Banks book. Clever, well-written and tightly plotted, A Piece of My Heart works as a crime novel but also as a time capsule of a bygone era. My only niggle is that for all the effort Robinson put into writing a wonderful, gripping story, the kindle version I read had so many errors - typos, punctuation, syntactical, it was incredible. I have never read a professionally published work so littered with mistakes and it was really annoying. You pay for quality - even in electronic form - and expect it. I think Robinson has been let down in this regard. Fortunately, the story is so good, it didn't detract (too much) from my reading pleasure.

[Larraine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was one of the most fascinating and interesting books in the series and that is saying a lot. There hasn't been one that I didn't like a lot. This one is actually two stories that intertwine.



The book opens with the discovery of a beautiful young woman who has been brutally murdered. The body was discovered after a 1969 music festival in Brimleigh Glen. When DI Chadwick is called in, he is suprised because it's not his "patch." However, he is told that the locals really aren't up to that kind of investigation so he is to take the lead. Chadwick is a crusty, WW2 veteran who saw things he can't forget and often has nightmares about them. He's trying to have more tolerance for hippies and the new architecture that's taking the place of the beautiful old Victorian buildings. He is also trying to understand the changes he's seeing in his 16 year old daughter, Yvonne.



Back to the present, Banks is investigating the death of a free lance writer who was staying in the area, apparently writing about the group The Mad Hatters, a psychedelic pastoral group - a term I hadn't heard before. However, a website I found mentions the Byrds, The Band & Bob Dylan among others.


The writer's laptop and mobile are both missing. It takes a while to track him down and see what he was investigating. He told a young woman that he was on the trail of a murder from the past. He's in the north because a former member of the band now lives in seclusion. He had suffered from mental illness for years which was made worse with the use of drugs and alcohol.

This is really an interesting look back at an era that I remember with a mixture of fondness and sadness.


https://pitchfork.com/features/pitchf...

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was the BBC production of DCI BAnks that prompted me to take up this series, and I'm glad that I did. Banks has a new boss, a very ambitious woman; he and Annie are good friends, but have obviously had a different relationship in the past; his son Brian and girlfriend have "come to stay" with him for awhile. We know from the beginning that the murder of a freelance journalist is tied to a previous murder of a young woman with ties to a 60's rock band at a long ago open air festival. It takes time for our detectives to make the connection; meanwhile, it's interesting to compare present day to the 60's in terms of cultural differences, gender attitudes, generational conflicts, and especially changes in technology and police procedures. I'm going to want to go back to the beginning of this series.

[Mary Balmer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I adore Robinson's Inspector Banks series, and each novel typically delivers the perfect blend of intrigue, character development, and plot. But this one...not so much. I really did not care for the constant flip-flop between the two cases: each set in its own time, place, and with a different set of characters. No sooner had I re-familiarized myself with one scenario, than Robinson would switch to the other! And this was every couple of pages! This jolting, fragmented, format made it impossible to lose myself in the story. Such a disappointment. I hope that this was just a one-time stumble from Robinson, and that future books from him continue to be as excellent as his earlier ones.

[Mark Robison · Rating 2 out of 5]

Easily the least of the 15 or so Inspector Banks books I've read. A young woman is killed during a Led Zeppelin concert headlining a festival in a Yorkshire field, and it seems linked to a killing in present day. The thing about the book is that there are never any peaks or valleys, it's at a constant, steady pace, which just wasn't compelling. And then the structure feels off. The last flashback scene made me sigh with boredom.

Bechdel test: Pass

Grade: C

[Elizabeth Desole · Rating 2 out of 5]

A bit too slow coming to the point for a mystery for my taste. I generally want my mysteries to be fast and exciting reads. I really couldn't see the point of another description of the (modern day) detective's lunch.Also didn't really give a hoot about any of the characters. It's a bit of a feat to make a boring murder mystery about the late 60's rock scene

[Bettie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bettie's Books

[Jimmy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Verry boring!

[David Freeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed it. Really liked the link to the past in 1969. I was around then. We actually got married then. And it was good making links to real bands. Even Jethro Tull got a mention. Now for #17.

[Budge Burgess · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s an improvement on the previous Banks, a bit more fluid, the writing initially a bit more dynamic – two murders, decades apart, two whodunnits for the price of one. It’s an improvement, at least for the first third.
But, by the second third of the book it gets bogged down. We get absorbed into … into what? Robinson was in his 50s when he wrote this one – both murders concern the music industry and rock bands. Some men in their 50s buy large motorbikes … was Robinson’s option to try to recapture the music of his teenage years?
We’re back into the late 60s and music festivals and repeated injections of reminiscences of Zepelin and Floyd and a score of the other big names of the time. Their music echoes down the decades to Banks’ contemporary investigation of the death of a music journalist and the archaeology of a Yorkshire band implicated in both murders.
There’s scope there, but the tale or rather tales get bogged down. Too much musical archaeology, too much moralising about sex and drugs We get an abundance of clichés, we get exercises in one dimensional characterisation, particularly in the introduction of a new boss for Banks.
And the denouement? There was actually a potentially engrossing story there if Robinson had downplayed the 1960s investigation and instead allowed Banks’ team to backtrack, to detect.
Instead, we get a ludicrous piece of contrived coincidence to link the two murders … and a really soft ending. The dynamic peters out, we get moralising, we get pontification about adolescence and politics … not to mention the constant dreary references to lists of bands and LPs and the almost neurotic description of what the characters eat and drink in their regular visits to pubs and restaurants.
Given that Robinson had a year in which to write the book – he seems to have been churning out a Banks a year, roughly – he could have spent more time weaving the plot a bit better, a bit more time thinking about characterisation. Instead, we get nostalgia and some seriously simplistic plotting. I also bet Robinson was a frustrated rock star.
So, disappointingly average.

[Stuart · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good Banks mystery. And with a title like "Piece of my Heart", it allows the author to indulge in musical memories from 1969 (which in retrospect seems to have been a pretty good year for music). There are actually two mysteries to be solved, one from 1969, with a whole other cast of characters; Banks was a student then, it seems. Then a second murder in contemporary times, that of a journalist who was researching a local band, the Mad Hatters. The Mad Hatters are in fact the link between the two periods, having, like Fleetwood Mac, reinvented themselves in the between times.
Much of the action takes place at a music festival held in the local area and featuring many of the mega stars of the era, including Led Zeppelin and Fleetwood Mac and the Who. The book even mentions that the Who are contemplating a live album locally. ("Live at Leeds" anyone?) A nice little Easter Egg dropped in where one of the suspects is working on a Vincent Black Lightning 1952 (Gettit?) *(Richard Thompson, if you didn't see it right away).
Anyway, it seems that the journalist stumbled on a crime that caused history to rear up and kill him. So we have two deaths, 50 years apart being investigated. Lots of 1969 attitudes dropped into the story. Are they the conservative views of the author, one wonders, or only of the 1960's, ex-army policemen of the time? And Banks has a new boss, a fiercely ambitious woman, who tells him he can do as he wants, as long as his results show her in a good light. Nice to know!
Anyway, it's a good read, with only minor confusion caused by the flipping from 1969 to the present.

[Christine Mathieu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Robinson never disappoints. Eben though he lives in Canada, he describes the Yorkshire Dales in which his mysteries take place so vividly that you feel tempted to go there on vacation.
Well, we did last year in May, but unfortunately had 3 rainy days. :(

This sequel tells two stories, a new murder case about a journalist and author and parallel an old murder case from 1969 about a rock band called the Mad Hatters.
As I love stories and movies about cold cases, this was my kind of novel!

If you've never read any of the DCI Banks novels before, start with "In a Dry Season"...it will get you hooked.

[Bob · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book follows two murders years apart and has Inspector Banks searching back to the older one in an attempt to get a handle on his. The first murder happened at a rock concert back in the hippy/flower child era and was connected to a local bad of the era. The current murder was of a writer doing an article on the band. Lots of name dropping of the major bands of the time and Bank's problems with a new boss. Eventually connections are made and questions answered.,

[Jane Withers · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5... a good easy read .. I’m a huge fan of Inspector Banks the character as he’s a bit of a piss head ;-) ..
it’s very rare I don’t enjoy a Peter Robinson book . This is a good fast read and a decent storyline .

[Carol McKnight · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stepping into a book with DCI Banks again, after reading a few others, is like meeting up with an old friend, cosy and comfortable. What a man! Only Banks can be working on a case in 2005, and solve both it and another in 1969 at the same time. Well done!

[Ayny · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars. Banks goes on about music even more here...
some of the Police characters here are so stereotypical Brit I had to laugh.
Murder of a young woman during a UK festival/rock concert event of 1969 and how it ties in with current murder of a journalist looking at the history.

[Ray O'Hare · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well put together, 2 stories in parallel, but 30 years apart coming together at the end.