Forget about the ‘Paris Review’ or the ‘TLS’. For someone who sets their novels in Gibraltar, the scariest place to receive a review is the ‘Gibraltar Chronicle’. Not only is it an esteemed publication — the world’s second oldest English language newspaper still in print — but its knowledge of the Rock is second to none. So I hereby prostrate myself at the feet of Christine Thomson, who reviewed ‘Hollow Mountain’ for the ‘Chronicle’ this month, and Alice Mascarenhas, whose follow-up feature can be read by clicking the image to the right. Some of the former’s words below…
GIBRALTAR CHRONICLE, 9 JULY 2014
One of the advantages of being a literary critic is the exposure it gives to new authors, especially when they turn out to be rather good. Thomas Mogford was/is one such author, and it was fortuitous that I had the chance to crit his first novel in his ‘Spike’ Sanguinetti series, ‘Shadow of the Rock’. Although not a resident of Gibraltar, Mogford has spent time here and researched both Gibraltar and the Gibraltarians in detail, giving his characters (Spike Sanguinetti is a Gibraltarian lawyer) and setting considerable veracity. So much so that I remember with his first novel feeling that I had actually met the person on whom Spike Sanguinetti’s law partner was based – it took me time to realise that the character was just so well drawn that he felt completely familiar to one who had worked in a local law firm.
Spike, otherwise Somerset Sanguinetti, is the only child of a retired headmaster of Sacred Heart School, and his wife, herself a much loved teacher, whose unexplained suicide has been a source of tension between father and son for years. Their family home is in Chicardo’s Passage, and in town Spike is partner in a law firm with the solid, bon viveur Peter Galliano.
When the story opens, Spike is on the Paradise Coast of Italy, trying to locate Zahra, the wild creature he had met in Morocco and with whom he has fallen in love. He had recued her and brought her to Gibraltar from where she had eventually run off to a dubious life in Malta. Zahra is now apparently ‘owned’ by a known international criminal, Žigon, and has sent Spike a message to forget about her, to go away, and warning him that Žigon will not hesitate to kill anyone who crosses him. It is there Spike is forced to leave his search and return urgently to Gibraltar, where his partner, Peter Galliano, has been the victim of a hit and run and is lying in a coma in St Bernard’s Hospital.
I would love to elaborate further on the plot, which is really rather good, but then it might spoil your enjoyment. The denouement of each of the various strands is bloody and dramatic but satisfying – as it should be in a good thriller. Thomas Mogford’s ‘Hollow Mountain’ is published by Bloomsbury and is another success for this author who was shortlisted for the CWA Dagger award for best new crime writer with ‘Shadow of the Rock’, and has made an equally convincing job of ‘Hollow Mountain’. I hope it gives you as much pleasure as it gave me. Christine Thomson
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