Original Skin: David Mark

DS Aector McAvoy and his boss Trish Pharoah are back for a second adventure. The characters are fleshed out even more in this book. It appears that David Mark will continue to dig deeper into his characters lives as they work together.

McAvoy is a Scotsman. Large and very noticeable, he tries to blend in, unsuccessfully. Some descriptions from the book:

Detective sergeant Aector McAvoy spent his first months in plain clothes taking the title literally. He all but camouflaged himself in khaki-colored trousers, hiking boots, and cheap, mushroom-hued shirts, tearing them fresh from polythene packets every Monday. The disguise never worked. At six foot five inches, and with red hair, freckles, and a Highlander mustache, he is always the most noticeable man in the room.

It was his young wife, Roisin, who put a stop to his attempts to blend in. ...

Under her guidance, and blushing at every alteration to his wardrobe, McAvoy had become known within the force as much for his smart suits and cashmere coat, for his leather satchel and cuff links, as for his detective skills and scars.

McAvoy blushes a lot, and seems naive at times.

There are two plot lines going simultaneously in Original Skin.  McAvoy and his boss, Detective Superintendant Pharoah, are working on a high profile case related to drug gangs and killings involving tortured and mutilated bodies. McAvoy takes an interest in an unrelated death of a young man; the death was originally thought to be suicide. He pursues this case without explicit approval from his boss.

I have mixed feelings about this book. It has some very good characteristics, and has gotten high praise in many reviews, but the elements of gritty violence and the emphasis on sex in the story line turned me off. A lot of this is encountered at the beginning of the book, but these themes do continue throughout the book. I have not yet figured out why some books with violence and dark themes bother me more than others, but this one went over the line for me.

I enjoyed David Mark's first book in this series, Dark Winter.  In my review of that book, I described the protagonist ...

McAvoy is a likeable character, honest, well-meaning, idealistic. He is humble, and doesn't believe in himself; worries a lot about whether he is making the right decision. He is a family man, a devoted father, worried that he is making his family suffer when he pays more attention to the job.

After reading this book I would add:  He is a policeman more dedicated to the solving of crimes and righting wrongs than he is to rising in the ranks or impressing his superiors.

All of this is very good, but he does go off on his own a bit too much, and that is what made this story seem unrealistic to me. Most fiction, and especially crime fiction, veers off in this direction because we want to read about unique and courageous people. But this was a niggle for me when reading this book.

Good points:

• The characterization is very good. We get a very clear picture of McAvoy and his wife and his co-workers and his superior officer.
• There are many interesting and strong female characters.
• I like a story to move and pull me in. This one has very good pacing and never drags, not in all of the 427 pages. 

Negative points:

• Written in present tense. I don't like this style of writing but I found this acceptable in the first novel. In this one, it bothered me throughout the book.
• Many unsettling scenes of violence, descriptions of bodies. This story and its telling was too dark and gruesome for me.
• Too much emphasis on McAvoy's personal life. It does come into the plot and it is not boring. I like to know some background on the main characters, but this one has too much of that element for me.

Because Original Skin has received so many positive reviews. I would advise most readers to try the book, with the warning that there are scenes of violence that are hard to take. There is also a good bit of foul language, which doesn't bother me at all but definitely can put off some readers.

See these other reviews at In Search of the Classic Mystery, The Crime Segments, and Euro Crime.

I am committed to reading the third book in this series, Sorrow Bound. I dithered about reading this book first or just skipping to Sorrow Bound. I am now glad that I read Original Skin, because it does fill in more information and background about his family and other policemen that he works with. For me, this will be useful in going on to the next book.