The city is divided and obsessed with foreigners coming from all over. Many Londoners don’t like it. And a group of white supermacists who call themselves Make England Great Again, is waging a war against coloured foreigners.
A murdered Singaporean Indian muslim, Mohamed Kamal, in Chinatown threatens to trigger a race war when some racist graffiti is scrawled near the body. It is linked to the Make England Great Again group, whose leader Billy Evans, is an expert in manipulating his supporters through incendiary speeches to get them to do his biddings.Detective Inspector Stanley Low, who is bipolar and smart in his own way, arrives in London to give a talk at the London School of Economics. He is from Singapore and is inevitably drawn into the case after being invited to help out by his former ex and also Detective Inspector Ramila Mistry and her hubby Detective Constable Tom Devonshire.
Low hates everyone almost as much as he hates himself. He is plunged into a polarised city, where xenophobia and intolerance is evident everywhere he goes.In a desperate race to identify a far-right serial killer, Low finds himself face-to-face with charismatic Neo-Nazi leaders, incendiary radio hosts and Met Police officers who don’t like the foreigner’s interference in the case.
As Low confronts the darkest corners of a racist soul, the Chinese detective realises he is the wrong face in the wrong place. But ironically, he’s the right cop for the case as he has the ability to think out of the box to get to the real killer.
Humphreys plays a canny game here, using a topical situation – hate crime and the rising intolerance towards immigrants in the UK in recent years - to bring forth a story that is almost too believable to be fiction.The divisive subject is captured with the two breakfast radio hosts - Beckett and Jones - whose opinions are as opposite as they are contradictory. Evans and his supporters have no redeeming quality and are the main suspects for the murder. But is he depraved enough to commit it?
This is a story of culture, class, race, religion and hate and everything in between.For all the darkness and the scenes which can be tense and emotional, there is a defining thread of humour and great characters who keep what could be a very dark murder mystery story enjoyable to read.