Det Insp Faraday became my new best friend last year after I exhausted other cop series like Serailler, Resnick and Rebus.

I devoured the first nine in a few months, and discovered there's no one better than Hurley at capturing the grittiness of urban society and modern policing.

Here's the latest paperback, further developing the compelling and complex trinity of good cop Faraday, bad ex-cop Winter and drug lord Bazza Mackenzie.

Faraday is investigating the brutal but unlamented murder of someone who had ruthlessly ruled their estate, while Winter is helping Mackenzie's stop his marriage daughter's affair with a cop.

Although there is plenty of murder and mayhem in Hurley's vividly-realised Portsmouth, Beyond Reach is probably more about the men than the crimes. If you like police procedural novels then it would be a crime to miss this: but read the earlier books first.

David Knights