Colin Crampton is the crime reporter for the Daily Chronicle set in the Swinging Sixtiesas he tracks down crimes and events on the mean streets of Brighton. From a greedy cousin desperate for cash to a mysterious set of suitcases,disappearing people to dodgy goings-on at the greyhound racing, Colin roams around looking for stories, and occasional having the stories find him,all the while trying to make sure he does not annoy his editor, the woodbine smoking Mr Figgis.

This is a concise collection of criminally clever comedy capers. Although each story is short, there are seven different tales of crime and mystery.What is great fun is that each one contains a few clues as to what is happening and clever readers can sometimes pick up on these and work it outbefore the reveal at the end of each story. The characters are briefly and quickly fleshed out to provide clues to the crime and turn into an eclecticcast for Colin to interact with. The descriptions of the areas that Colin wanders into are similarly brief but still add neat touches and clues to thestory as well. The writing is smart and funny, blending the two genres surprisingly well to provide a sly sense of humour for the reader to enjoywhile the mysteries are being solved.

There are a lot more of these stories out there and I am more than tempted to go and look some of them up, if they are as good as the first set. Theonly issue I had with the novel, was not the stories, but all the advertising for these and other stories and the author’s notes which areinterspersed throughout. Combining all the stories into one block and then adding the notes and adverts around it would have been preferable.

However, this is a fun set of short stories to read that I would recommend for anyone to pick up for a coffee break, not just for fans of thegenre.