ANDY HEDGECOCK is entertained by a playful novel that embeds a fictional game at its heart
IN MYCROFT and Sherlock (Titan, £17.99) by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anna Waterhouse, rising star at the War Office Mycroft Holmes has no interest in the macabre murders taking place in London in 1872.
The victims are Chinese, so no doubt the killings have something to do with the opium trade — a distasteful business, to be sure, but one that is necessary to protect and promote Britain's interests as a trading power.
JULIA THOMAS unpicks the mental processes that explain why book-to-film adaptations so often disappoint
JONATHAN TAYLOR attempts to disentangle the mind, self and political opinions of a successful bourgeois novelist
Timeloop murder, trad family MomBomb, Sicilian crime pages and Craven praise
BLANE SAVAGE recommends the display of nine previously unseen works by the Glaswegian artist, novelist and playwright



