Gallows View - Peter Robinson

I thought I’d heard of most of fiction’s leading detectives, but a recent promotional offer from Bananas, an offshoot of The Book People, alerted me to the existence Peter Robinson’s Inspector Banks. He’s been around since 1987, apparently, albeit confined to the shadows of Messrs. Morse, Frost, Rebus et al, not to mention several European counterparts, so no wonder, perhaps, that I’d never come across him previously. With the front cover of _Gallows ...
...from none other than Ian Rankin, the creator of Rebus, I was persuaded to make the purchase. And then I read a number of readers’ reviews which turned out to be a rather mixed bunch of opinions – some were full of praise for Robinson’s work, others were indifferent, whilst a few were positively scathing in their criticism – I wondered which of them I’d agree with.


Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks, to give him his full rank ... more

I thought I’d heard of most of fiction’s leading detectives, but a recent promotional offer from Bananas, an offshoot of The Book People, alerted me to the existence Peter Robinson’s Inspector Banks. He’s been around since 1987, apparently, albeit confined to the shadows of Messrs. Morse, Frost, Rebus et al, not to mention several European counterparts, so no wonder, perhaps, that I’d never come across him previously. With the front cover of Gallows View (the opening book in the series) bearing an endorsement from none other than Ian Rankin, the creator of Rebus, I was persuaded to make the purchase. And then I read a number of readers’ reviews which turned out to be a rather mixed bunch of opinions – some were full of praise for Robinson’s work, others were indifferent, whilst a few were positively scathing in their criticism – I wondered which of them I’d agree with.

Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks, to give him his full rank and title, has moved from London to the Yorkshire Dales (where author Robinson lived before emigrating to Canada) in order to escape the hurly-burly of city life in favour of a supposedly quieter existence in the village of Eastvale. He’s 36 years old and married - happily, by all accounts - has two children, and as far as we can see at this early stage, possesses none of the usual character flaws associated with the average fictional policeman. Apart from a joint passion for opera and jazz, which he listens to through his Walkman (in today’s world, he would have an I-Pod, of course), and a liking for a drop of malt from time to time, he’s a pretty average sort of bloke with no apparent vices or weaknesses, an amiable and thoroughly upright member of Yorkshire’s finest. Which is all very well, but in the densely-populated world of literary detectives, a chap needs to have some sort of trademark attribute (or personality defect) if he’s going to stand out from the crowd and be remembered with any sort of affection, or otherwise.

A couple of the reviews I read described the book as being along similar lines to Heartbeat – the cosy, Sunday night TV series also set in a Yorkshire village – and whilst I can see what they mean to an extent, I wouldn’t say I agree totally with that sentiment. The location is very similar of course, and as in the fictitious Aidensfield, crime in Eastvale generally tends to be of the petty variety, but with the “f” and the “c” words used unflinchingly in Gallows View, it’s enough to make poor old P.C. Ventress topple off his bicycle from the shock of it all. The police tend to be less jolly and laid-back in Eastvale than they are in Aidensfield and the criminals nastier and decidedly more brutal, so perhaps “Heartbeat with attitude” would be a more apt description.

As we’re introduced to Banks, he’s involved in three cases at once: an elderly woman has been found dead in her home, with foul play not being ruled out; there’s a spate of housebreaking going on, and a peeping-tom is getting his kicks by watching the village’s womenfolk undress through the chinks in their curtains. All fairly mundane stuff, but typical, I’d imagine, of the kind of everyday cases the police in a small English village might expect to find themselves investigating, despite the efforts of television and film producers to convince us that these places are rife with blackmailers, murderers and the like, with their victims dropping like flies all over the show. So, top marks for realism and credibility as far as subject matter goes.

The location is pretty convincing, too, after all, Yorkshire was author Robinson’s stomping ground before leaving these cold shores for the even less charitable climes of Canada, and there’s plenty of descriptive prose which gives readers a good feel for the area. Unexaggerated Yorkshire dialect and a smattering of local surnames all add to the authenticity. Naturally enough though, with the book having been published in 1987, there are parts of it which are inevitably going to seem dated; police procedures and attitudes, for example, as well as references to the politics and social mores of the time – feminism being one of the issues touched upon – but on the other hand, if one isn’t too critical, it comes across as nothing more than a harmless dose of nostalgia, and here’s where the likeness to Heartbeat comes in, I feel. As for accuracy in terms of police procedure and methods, I really wouldn’t know, but I’m guessing that anybody serving in the police force during that era will recognise certain attitudes, certain scenarios and certain personalities.

So where does this leave Inspector Banks in terms of likeability (or not) among his peers? The truth is, I can’t make up my mind. He’s a nice enough individual, some would say too nice for a mid to high-ranking police officer, and that’s just the trouble; there’s nothing about him that makes you either like or dislike him, he’s too banal, too nondescript to enable one to form an opinion either way. A small glimmer of hope for the man is the presence of police psychologist Jenny Fuller, brought in to provide a profile of the peeping-tom, and for whom Banks has, if not exactly the hots, then the lukewarms, and a liaison looks as though it could be on the cards in the future. Cleverly, Robinson holds back on a full-blown affair, presumably to reintroduce the premise later on in the series, but it just makes you wish Banks would get on with things, if only to provide some intrigue for his readers and for himself, some much-needed kudos.

Unusually, I find myself sitting on the fence, or perhaps that should be the dry stone wall, on this one; I’m tempted to write off Banks as a dullard and a non-starter, but on second thought, and having had a sneak preview of the second book in the series, I’d like to see how his character develops, albeit twenty-odd years after the event. When all’s said and done, it’s both a very passable and plausible police yarn, down to earth and lacking in sensationalism; at worst, it’s a book to be read and then forgotten about.

 

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