Plender

Brian Plender is a glittering evil on par with Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley or Jim Thompson’s Lou Ford. In Plender the author of Get Carter and GBH delivered a tense and psychologically complex tale of revenge and blackmail that rightfully belongs among crime fictions most chilling ranks.

Two men share a common history. Growing up together in the small town of Barton-Upon-Humber in Lincolnshire, England, Peter Knott is everything that Brian Plender wishes he were. Knott is suave, good-looking, an exemplary student and popular. The friendship they maintain is as important to Plender as it is forgettable to Knott, and this eventually leads to a lasting humiliation for Brian.

Years later Brian Plender is a dangerous man. A private investigator who specializes in…