Review: Sealfinger, by Heide Goody and Iain Grant

Sealfinger

Some bodies just won’t stay buried.

When a client tells Sam Applewhite she’s seen ghosts in the nearby graveyard, Sam dismisses it as the ramblings of an old woman. She’s got bigger things to worry about — Keeping on top of her job at DefCon4 Security Services isn’t easy – particularly since her manager is a cactus and no one will tell her what her job actually is.

But when the ghost-spotting client goes missing and only Sam suspects foul play, she is compelled to dig deeper.

Aided by her retired stage magician father and the owner of the most outlandish junk shop on the sea front, Sam dives into a mystery involving psychotic seals,  unexploded air force munitions, DIY foot surgery and a corpse that just won’t quit.

Purchase Links

UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sealfinger-Sam-Applewhite-Book-1-ebook/dp/B095LRYSTN/

US – https://www.amazon.com/Sealfinger-Sam-Applewhite-Book-1-ebook/dp/B095LRYSTN/

My Review

Thanks to the authors for sending me a copy of their book and to Rachel for organising the blog tour.

Sam Applewhite has an odd job, working for DefCon4, a contractor that does security, supervising community payback schemes, house inspections and meals on wheels. In the Skegness office there’s just her and a cactus called Doug. She’s trying to help her dad out because the aging stage magician is in a financial mess. When one of her MoW customers goes missing and the local police are uninterested, Sam gets drawn into a mystery that has her tangling with dodgy builders, the local ‘criminal’ element, a mad seal, her ex-boyfriend, and the local business guild. Small town shenanigans on the Lincolnshire coast.

I wasn’t feeling great today because of work responsibilities and the pressure to get four books read in ten days was getting to me, so despite having a whole house of my own, I retreated to my bedroom with a bottle of juice, a tube of BBQ Pringles and this book. Took me about six hours to read all 427 page. Goode and Grant do not write short books. Luckily, I have strange and possibly unhealthy reading habits developed over 30 years of being a recluse. I wasn’t as much of a recluse for the first 8 years…

Skeggy! We all love Skeg, play town of the East Midlands coast, home to Butlins and mad seagulls. The coast north and south of it is lovely, lonely, reclaimed land, perfect for North Sea swimming, seal watching and getting semi-decent fish and chips.

The authors engage in some gentle humour about the popularity of the town with working class East Midlanders. It’s true, the place is full of families from everywhere from Sheffield to Leicester and Nottingham, sometimes even people from Grimsby go for a week, brigades of elders on their mobility scooters and really garish outdoors décor. It makes Blackpool look classy. I enjoyed some of the humour and the observational comedy. The punny title is definitely funny. It makes total sense in the context of events and has a ‘James Bond’ feel to it, although Sam is far from being a suave sophisticated action hero.

I enjoyed the relationship between Sam and her dad, and their friendship with Delia. The plot was quite engrossing and entertaining. The mad dash across a mine fields chased by a man on a lawnmower was particularly amusing. The weaving of the investigation in with the perpetrators chapters was interesting and kept me turning the page to see if Sam would work it all out and thwart the criminals.

The characters all seem to have interesting backstories and lives that have happened and go on while they are not in the chapters, which makes they feel real, complete and rounded people.

The authors bring up some really important problems in Lincolnshire, like the lack of housing and employment that isn’t seasonal, dodgy builders and the outsourcing of social services to private companies. It’s a real issue for everyone in Lincolnshire because it is so rural and isolated in places.

Generally, I highly rate this book, because it tells a good story, with an interesting mystery, and is quite accurate in its descriptions of my glorious homeland. I’m going to read the next one tomorrow (Tuesday 29th June). Mainly because my spot on the blog tour is Friday and I still have to read book three by next Monday. I’m quite looking forward to it.

Couple of things, Heide and Iain – Your fatphobia and snobbery is showing. And only people who are from Lincolnshire get to take the piss out of Lincolnshire. Some of those jokes and commentary about people in Lincolnshire or the working class visitors to the coast weren’t gentle or a bit of teasing, they were nasty, snobbish and judgemental. Also, the connection between weight and diabetes isn’t causative.