Recommended Reads: The Kiszka and Kershaw Trilogy by Anya Lipska
Crime Fiction. Recommended Read: Poland. London.
The Kiszka and Kershaw Trilogy by Anya Lipska
Where the Devil Can’t Go (Kiszka & Kershaw, Book 1)
Janusz Kiszka is a Polish ex-pat who has been living in London for over twenty years. A man with a past he’d rather forget. Janusz is a ‘fixer’. A kind of unofficial Private Eye.
When he is asked by his priest to track down a missing Polish waitress it seems like a straightforward case of a young girl running away with her boyfriend.
However, as Janusz searches for the girl, he digs deeper and uncovers something much more sinister. Meanwhile, D C Natalie Kershaw, new to the job and trying to make her mark, is investigating the suspicious death of a young Polish girl whose body is washed up from the river Thames. And, of course, the two stories intertwine.
Where The Devil Can’t Go is the cracking début novel from Anya Lipska, which mixes a well paced police procedural with a tense political thriller. The world of the Polish ex pat in London is brilliantly drawn, as are the scenes set in Poland, and both Janusz Kiszka and Natalie Kershaw are vivid, gritty, no-nonsense characters who deserve to feature in more novels.
Where The Devil Can’t Go is a great calling card for Anya Lipska and surely the start of an addictive new crime series.
Death Can’t Take a Joke (Kiszka & Kershaw, Book 2)
When London based Polish private eye Janusz Kiszka’s close friend is violently murdered, he decides to track down those responsible. Meanwhile, Detective Natalie Kershaw is trying to find out the identity of an apparent suicide victim. As in Lipska’s previous novel, Where The Devil Can’t Go, their investigations collide.
The second Kiszka & Kershaw crime thriller is even better than the first. The plotting is as tight as a snare drum, the characters are realistic and likable, the dialogue is sharp. Gripping, gritty but never grim, Death Can’t Take A Joke is also very funny, the humour coming naturally from the well-drawn characters’ interactions.
Great stuff!
A Devil Under the Skin: A Kiszka & Kershaw thriller (Kiszka and Kershaw Book 3)
Things are looking up for Janusz Kiszka, big-hearted 'fixer' to London's Poles. Kasia, the love of his life, is finally leaving her no-good husband to make a new life with him. But then she vanishes – tearing the big Pole’s world apart. Convinced she’s been abducted, he must swallow his pride and seek the help of maverick cop Natalie Kershaw, who’s suspended following a fatal shooting. But the search swiftly takes an even darker turn… What connects Kasia’s disappearance and a string of brutal East End murders? And who is the murderous enforcer stalking the streets of London?