GoodCopBadCop – Jim Alexander

 

*I received a free copy of this book, with thanks to the author.  The decision to review and my opinions are my own.*

 

 

 

Blurb:  GoodCopBadCop is a modern crime take on Jekyll and Hyde where the ‘good cop’ and ‘bad cop’ are the same person. It is a modern-day police procedural story where our main character tries to juggle the various crimes he’s investigating while juggling the psychotic impulses inside him. This is not a story about a good man turned bad, or a bad man turned good. Both good and bad arrived at the same time.

 

 

 

 

DI Brian Fisher is a quiet, genial, unobtrusive type of fellow.  Mild and inoffensive he passes through the streets and the police station mostly unnoticed, or gently avoided for his tendency to waffle streams of pleasant trivia.  Appearances, and mannerisms can be deceptive though, as his new partner discovers that DI Fisher actually has an instinct for slotting cases together quickly and efficiently, always managing to be a step or two ahead of the rest of the investigative force.

And DI Fisher has a darker, hairier, red-eyed secret too.  The horrors he sees on a daily basis and his repression of the anger they arouse has awoken another side to his personality;  one that is not meek, genial and pleasant but angry, bestial, sadistic and psychotic.  Both of him are determined to do the job in front of him and cleanse the streets of Glasgow, but fundamentally disagree about the methods required!

There are some really big issues explored here under the comic-book style action.  Does the end justify the means when it comes to removing evil?  There is a recurrent refrain of ‘I do it so that you don’t have to’, which really made me ponder the morality of punishment and enforcement.  Would people still desire ‘an eye for an eye’ if they were the ones holding the ocular scoop?  Is it easier for most of us just to turn a blind eye to methods as long as the end result is what we need?

GoodCopBadCop is a Jekyll-and-Hyde (or The Hulk) adventure into two very different ways of getting the criminals off the streets, contained within one very different man.  Recommended for those who like their crime and punishment visceral (red in tooth and baton) and unnerving.

 

The streets–you’ve heard of them, perhaps even spoken of them in hushed tones–which offer no safety, respite, no love or financial security, only the opposite.  Do or die; the fight for survival; the right to live out some kind of life.
This is the point you leave the room and I come in.  You can trust me.  Go on, sit back while I do all the work.  You can look away.  You could argue, but that would mean looking at me in the eye.
Relax, I’ll clear up the mess.  Without a further thought, it’s okay to return to the slow, inexorable process of rotting away while tucked up safely in your bed.
Right now, a human heart and severed hand lie discarded in a Glasgow alleyway.

– Jim Alexander, GoodCopBadCop

 

You can follow Jim Alexander on Twitter and Goodreads, and also find more from him at Planet Jimbot on Facebook and Twitter.

GoodCopBadCop is available on Amazon right now!

 

 

 

 

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