Avid Series Reader's Reviews > The Blood-Dimmed Tide

The Blood-Dimmed Tide by Rennie Airth is the second book of the John Madden mystery series set in 1930s England. It's been over a decade since the massacre at Melling Lodge, but John Madden, Billy Styles and Angus Sinclair haven't forgotten the horror of the case. John Madden has left Scotland Yard and happily settled into farm life with his wife Helen. Billy Styles fulfilled his potential to become a successful detective, after the excellent mentoring he received from John. Angus Sinclair is chief detective inspector at Scotland Yard, still missing the brilliance of his former detective Madden, staying in touch with them despite Helen's reluctance. I recommend reading the first book, The River of Darkness, to understand the characters and background for this book.

A young girl goes missing on a walk by the woods. A simple-minded tramp who passed through the woods is distressed and fearful; he hands over a girl's shoe to Helen then hides. John Madden assists in the hunt through the woods, and finds the missing girl's body, raped and brutally beaten. The savagery of the beating deeply upsets John. He suspects there is a serial killer on the loose.

Helen strenuously objects to John getting drawn into Scotland Yard cases. She wants to protect John's peace of mind, shattered by past events up to and including his WWI service, gradually restored by their peaceful decade of country life, rearing their children. Haunted by the murder, John teams up with Billy Styles again, and together they find clues that link previous similar crimes. It's tough going, not dangerous at first, but instead very difficult to trace the evidence that stretches back years.

John is puzzled by a 3-year gap in reported crimes that seem to be related. At first he assumes the killer was imprisoned during that time, but they don't find any evidence to support that theory. Then John wonders, what if the killer was abroad those years?

The connection to international crime files (precursor to Interpol) yields the breakthrough. John identifies a serial killer, who John learns (with great difficulty) is a rogue intelligence agent. Suspense mounts in alternating chapters as law enforcement painstakingly tries to find a ruthless killer, while the killer selects and stalks the next victim.

Dogged, focused police procedural work is blended with elements of an international crime thriller to create a complex, interesting plot set against a backdrop of growing political threat in Europe.