CY@CY Says Welcome to my dreamscape. Where a Lim is also a Ling.
Love Like Blood by Mark Billingham casts the spotlight on the very controversial and sensitive subject of honour killings. Honour killings are the killings of a family member due to perceived loss of honour caused by the behaviour of the said family member. Honour killings are being carried out frequently despite the public outrage. Murdering the very people whom you should love and protect is truly horrifying.
Arriving at the door of her house, teacher Susan Best is set upon by two assailants who squirt bleach in her eyes with water guns before stabbing her. It turns out that the victim is the lesbian partner of DI Nicola Tanner, a Metropolitan Police detective who has been investigating honour killings within the Muslim, Sikh and Hindu communities. She believes that a network is in place whereby go-betweens set up the murders for Asian families, using contract assassins.
Tanner is placed on compassionate leave after the murder of her partner. The grieving Nicola is not allowed to have anything to do with the case. She enlists the help of DI Tom Thorne, a man whose disregard of rules is legendary. Tanner is convinced that Susan’s death was a case of mistaken identity and that Tanner herself was the real target.
Then Amaya Shah and Kamal Azim are reported missing but Tanner is certain their disappearance fits the pattern of the other honour killings. They are both 18 and from Bangladeshi families. Tanner believes there is something fake about the reaction from their families and she convinces Thorne to pulls some strings to get the case assigned to him.
When Amaya is found dead, suspicion falls on Kamal, and Thorne’s boss, DCI Russell Brigstocke, is determined that the investigation will concentrate on the obvious conclusion that Kamal was responsible for the death of his girlfriend as Kamal’s semen was found on Amaya. Thorne and Tanner are certain they are being deliberately led to that conclusion by the killers. The tensions mounts as Tanner and Thorne confronts leaders from the Muslim, Sikh and Hindu communities and investigate the family backgrounds of Amaya and Kamal.
The novel hurtles towards a complex ending with a couple of big twists. The story is realistic and the tempo never slows as a sinister pair go about their contract killings.