I have read two previous Detective Harry McCoy novels so To Die in June is my third but will it be my last? In this novel, Harry McCoy's chickens have surely come home to roost. He's doing favours he shouldn't be but ever the pragmatic polis, he exercises his own form of justice. I really like the period the novels are set in, where the only high tech is probably a polis radio made by Pye or Burndept. Detective McCoy must be the epicentre of a perpetual fug, I expect he's a forty a day man (and that's when he's trying to give up). The state of his lungs, throat and mouth aren't the only health issues he has, as he complains about a threatening stomach ulcer especially when he hits the booze. However, Harry's had a very tough life and childhood so we can forgive him a few vices. He's also got a very cynical view of the church (no doubt from his childhood) and it's borne out in this novel, sadly to the further detriment of his health and up-market suit. The ending of the book makes me wonder if that be the last we hear of McCoy. I do hope not as he's one of my favourite cops.

To Die in June is the 6th book in the consistently excellent Harry McCoy series by Alan Parks.

Set in 1970s Glasgow it brings the city and its inhabitants to life and is another worthy addition to the series.

If you like true noir crime then this is the book and series for you.

More of the same from Parks in this latest entry in the Harry McCoy series. I am losing interest in this series as the latest instalments do not have plots that hold my interest. Many many characters and many many supporting characters make for frankly too many to keep track of, i am not sure how new readers would know where to begin. There were a few decent personal moments for McCoy as he deals with good news and bad news in his personal life. Overall i find an sense of bleakness in these stories which now make them a chore to read at times. Limited use of the Cooper character was appreciated and hopefully this trend continues...but the ending leaves me thinking maybe not. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy. 3+ stars

Book 6 in the Harry Mc Coy series, set in 1970's Glasgow, is as fresh as book 1. The characterisation is very good and I love the dynamics between Harry and Wattie. There is grit, suspense and some beautiful descriptive, emotional passages in this well thought out plot. I was transported right back to my 20's as a young police officer in Glasgow's south side. I would really recommend reading the series in order to fully understand the events. Thanks to Net Galley for my ARC.

First book I've read by the author and in the DI McCoy series. You get a real flavour of life of the police and the criminals, with often blurred lines between both, in 1970s Glasgow. The police certainly liked a ciggie and a drink back then!

Deftly plotted with elements of black humour running throughout the book, Alan Parks is a master of Scottish crime fiction.

Already ordered the first book in the series and fully intend to read the rest in order, something I'd recommend new readers to the series do.

The sixth in a compelling series, this is gritty stuff with a wonderful portraiture of Gasgow in the 70s tough, unrelenting and crime ridden.

Harry McCoy is an enigmatic policeman, committed to his job yet perhaps a touch too close to some of the villains that frequent his patch.

The writing is spare and yet witty at times, the action relentless, the plotting complex yet credible and the characters well drawn.

There is not much else you can ask for in a police procedural.

Highly recommended.

Another cracking release in Parks’ Harry McCoy series - the most dependable annual series I can think of right now. Usual balance of a couple of new investigations with the ongoing relationship with gang boss and old friend Cooper; To Die in June perhaps dials down the bleakness a wee bit (it’s coming in summer after all), but continues to explore the pervasive impact of corruption in the 70s police force, heavy drinking culture and the underbelly of the streets.

A somewhat downbeat ending leaves questions for July….

MCoy is back but at a different police station in Glasgow. Supposedly he is investigating corruption and eventually he does sort it out but as the story evolves it seems that McCoy himself is a bit too close to corrupt figures for a detective. The context of low life Glasgow is very well depicted as ever. There are several strands to the story most of which end in blood and disaster. The personal bits to McCoy’s life are good too. He has an unlikely female partner and his affection for his colleague Wattie’s son is a pleasing addition. Even if it is hard to accept the police behave in this way, it is a good read. I recommend it.

Another excellent Scottish noir novel set in Glasgow in the 70’s featuring the bent detective Harry McCoy and his faithful side-kick Wattie.
This one has them seconded to another cop-shop across town for
reasons Harry isn’t keen to divulge.
Other strands of the story involve police corruption, gang warfare, the puzzling deaths of homeless alcoholics, a strange cult, a missing child and the death of a small time thief.
The author does a great job of tying the pieces together.
There is an astonishing amount of violence and bloodletting (the latter Harry doesn’t cope with very well) however the unrelenting grimness is tempered with so much humour I raced through it in one sitting.
It does help to have read the previous books in order, each one takes
place over a specific month. I’m looking forward to July!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Canongate for an ARC

Glasgow, June 1975.

How can a boy be missing when, according to all records, he doesn't exist?

Just one of the problems facing Harry McCoy. Shunted across town to another station to secretly keep an eye on less than exemplary activity amongst his colleagues, the "missing" boy's family is part of a church bordering on a cult. And there are a lot of poisonings, but nobody's too bothered as all the victims are down-and-outs.

Excellent

I would like to thank Netgalley and Cannongate Books for an advance Copy of To Die in June, the sixth novel to feature DI Harry McCoy set in Glasgow in 1975.

A woman reports her young son, Michael, missing, but there is no record of him. They belong to an extreme religious sect and that makes McCoy suspicious, so he keeps investigating. At the same time he is looking in to the poisoning of several homeless men, no one else cares but his father is part of that community. This is all happening in Possil where McCoy and his sergeant “Wattie” have transferred to allow him to investigate potential corruption.

I thoroughly enjoyed To Die in June, which paints a realistic picture of life in Glasgow at the time and has a compulsive storyline with several strands. It is told from McCoy’s point of view, so the reader gets a close up view of events, most of which are either sad or dangerous. There wasn’t a lot of optimism at the time and the plot reflects that reality.

I found the novel intriguing. None of the crimes are blockbusters destined for the headlines, but they are all different and it was incredibly difficult to work out where they were going or how they would turn out. It rouses the reader’s curiosity and keeps the pages turning. I’m not sure if I found any of the resolutions satisfying as this novel has so much more of the moral ambiguity hinted at in the previous novels as McCoy crosses more than a few lines. I’m not saying that he has become an outright criminal, but at what point does the end justify the means? It’s very blurry.

The novel is well paced with each of the strands having a place and developing gradually. There are some twists, but the author saves the best for last with some big revelations that may be explored in future novels. All in all it is a well executed novel in pacing and plotting.

Harry McCoy is a very flawed character and his life choices are not the best, often landing him in bad situations. It is these situations and how he resolves them that take him far from the moral high ground. He’s self aware enough to realise this and this seems to contribute to his spiral. He’s very well drawn, as are the other characters. Their interactions will make weep or laugh.

To Die in June is a good read that I have no hesitation in recommending.

DI McCoy is a complex character, brought up in care, best pals with a gangster, alcoholic dad on the streets, incorruptible but sails so close to the wind you're not sure at times. This outing he's transferred to another station to report back on possible corruption. While he's doing that there is an outbreak of multiple deaths amongst homeless alcoholics - he's afraid its murder and that his dad will be next. there's also a missing child who on closer inspection doesn't exist - and more. Page turning action from start to finish, another great read from Alan Parks.

Set in Glasgow in the seventies, you would expect this novel to be hard hitting and unforgiving, It is just that. Harry McCoy has little respect for authority but is astute enough to walk the fine line between insubordination and the sack. And keeping his job is just one challenge, It only takes one rotten apple to spoil the barrel and Harry has landed amongst plenty. I loved the feel of this novel. Today, you would never envisage a copper sitting down in a pub and talking to a suspect or a ‘person of interest’ off the cuff. But that’s just one aspect that contributes to the overall feeling that McCoy is up to the task but can’t afford to turn his back for a second, Gritty, polished and absolutely as rough as they come.

Death on the streets of Glasgow in the 1970s isn't an unusual circumstance, as you will know if you are familiar with any of Detective Inspector Harry McCoy's dealings in Alan Parks' series. With the degree of poverty in the city and the amount of down-and-outs on the streets, death by natural causes - if you include drinking yourself to death as natural causes - is not uncommon either. That certainly seems to be the likely verdict on the cause of death of Jamie MacLeod, "Govan Jamie" when he is found on waste ground in May 1975 not far from Argyle Street. It had to happen sooner or later, and there's not much chance that anyone would have a reason to kill him. A witness however tells McCoy that he saw both Jamie and another down-and-out die after drinking from what appears to be tampered hooch in a bottle of Irn Bru.

Still, the deaths of two homeless alcoholics doesn't seem like grounds that will warrant any further investigation by the police, and McCoy has other things to worry about. From the first five Harry McCoy thrillers, we know that Glasgow in the 1970s can be a grim place, but things seem to be particularly unpleasant in the sixth book, To Die in June. Aside from the deaths of the two down-and-outs, there are another couple of stomach churning deaths in the opening chapters, and to make matters worse, McCoy's old childhood friend and gangster Stevie Cooper is making a play for Possil, the district where McCoy is currently posted. A gang war is the last thing he needs on his hands while this handful of recent deaths remains unexplained. All the while McCoy's posting to Possil is supposed to be an undercover operation, keeping an eye on suspected crooked dealing at the station.

It sounds grim, but taking his lead from McCoy's queasiness about blood, Alan Parks is not one to wallow in gory descriptions. He's less interested in salaciousness of the murders than in the underlying social problems that give rise to them. He has other ways to capture the impoverishment and the social inequities in the city in the down-to-earth settings of unsavoury pubs frequented by McCoy, in the dialogues and conversations where he gathers information from the types of characters who inhabit them, many of whom are likely to end up like Govan Jamie, not least of which is McCoy's own estranged father, and indeed McCoy has some demons of his own to battle with.

Inevitably, there are a lot of the elements that seem familiar from previous books in the McCoy series. Former crooks and gangsters are trying to establish themselves as respectable businessmen, brutal gangland wars are still raging, there are concerns about missing children, and there are a lot of grisly deaths involving people at the lower end of the social ladder that no-one seems particularly concerned about. There is another element that is familiar and it's a deeper undercurrent that ties all the other parts together; change and redevelopment. Glasgow is a city ripe for exploitation, the post-war wastelands ready to be wiped away and built on anew. That might sound like a promise of modernisation and an attempt to eradicate poverty, but good intentions are not on anyone's list. There is money to be made, people to be paid-off and a lot of not very nice people involved. Even the police - or at least those not already downright crooked and on the take - struggle to strike a balance between solving crime and putting a lid on it.

That's where McCoy comes in and it's what makes Alan Parks' books fascinating historical social documents as well as hugely compelling crime thrillers. Indeed, Parks started out that way in a fictionalisation of a real-life crime in Bloody January, before the series developed into something else. Some of the elements might be familiar then, but that is because there is a consistency and flow to the series, with different elements rising to the surface over time - the generational differences, the social inequities, the religious divide - and there in the middle of it is the police, or more specifically and pertinently, Harry McCoy. McCoy's allegiances and sense of duty have been tested before and will be tested again. Essentially it's a classic situation of how a good man deals with evil on a daily basis and tries to not be corrupted by it, not take sides, and at the same time not find himself crushed by it all. By the time we have got to To Die in June, it's starting to take its toll on McCoy.

There is a feeling that Parks is essentially just going with the flow, letting all these issue arise naturally out of the world he has (re-)created. Acknowledging the influence of William McIlvenny in this arena, Parks himself knows the Glasgow of this period well and knows that when all the social problems are stirred up by those with money, power and influence, it's a powder keg ready to explode and there will be casualties. Rather then repeating himself, Parks is continually building on previous books, showing how everything that is wrong is connected, that "Poverty will make people do terrible things" and it just takes the flap of a butterfly wing to unleash the chaos. Parks just lets this toxic mix throw up the opportunity for crime and the results, as mentioned earlier, are not going to be pretty, but they can be seen to come from an authentic place.

What also makes it more than just routine - although there is nothing routine really in how Parks relates this - is of course McCoy and his personal problems. We are aware of his difficult background in care, and can see that he is not far away from being a victim like those found on the waste ground of the city, places where his father now is falling apart drinking "red biddie", a lethal combination of red wine and meths. Although a respected police officer, currently stepping out with a movie-star girlfriend, it wouldn't take much for McCoy to end up like his father or like some of the old ex-police officers he encounters who mentored him in the past. Is he his father's son or his adopted father's son? That delicate balance of teetering on the edge, one that characterises the city of Glasgow itself in the seventies, is what makes this such a great series.

But it's not just McCoy; there is tremendous character in even the smallest of roles, from the current and former police officers to the down-and-outs and the witnesses. McCoy's colleague and friend Wattie is growing in confidence and character, beginning to stand up to McCoy, become his own man and more than just a sidekick. There is real development here. None of this takes place in isolation either, but is firmly related to what is going on there on the streets of Glasgow in the 1970s. That could take its toll on anyone, and even more so for someone of McCoy's background and profession. Despite external appearances, he seems more vulnerable, more fragile this time, and the consequences of what takes place in To Die in June are likely to resonate down through the remaining books in this remarkable and compelling series.

Delighted to be approved for this ARC having only recently binged the first five Harry McCoy books I was ready for more.

First I’d say you will have to read the first five books to really get into this and understand what’s going on so if you haven’t I suggest you do that now then come back to early summer.

Side note I love the play on the months of the year in the titles, furthermore I like how it’s not just set over a year the books span a few years but take us to specific month. Parks captures Glasgow perfectly at the time of year the books are set each time with all nuances of city at a particular time has.

Harry McCoy is classic character with big Rebus vibes but as Glasgow girl I find him more appealing, be it the patter or just how he is there something I connect with. Thought out the series he has developed into some more than I first thought, I’ve enjoyed seeing him grow and hearing more about his past. I like how he has inner struggles, doesn’t play by the rules but is good man even if that is at own cost. This book really highlights that’s aspect of character and made me like him even more. Harry is good character whom I suspect will last longer than December. I give him to October before he is hailed a classic Scottish Polis such as Laidlaw and Rebus.

Speaking of the characters in this book we reunited with familiar characters ones I was very glad to be reading about again and ones not so. I shouldn’t but I can’t help but really like Copper. Some of the regular characters could do with a little more development to stop them becoming boring and formative but all in all they’re a well written bunch. The usuals Glasgow faces and characters are among the new characters and like some of the regular ones do at times come across a little too formative but do add some colour and of course introduce new storey lines.

Throughout this book and the others you really get a picture of Glasgow at the time, the changing of the city landscape and the impact that has on the city and its people. I loved reading about places I recognise and the very Glasgow things of times gone by- just hearing city bakers makes long for a halloween cake- at 37 years old I can’t say I remember Glasgow in the 70’s but the book reminds so much of my childhood in Glasgow I can remember the lager lovelies, the cars and the city so clear when reading these books and I love it. You can tell Parks is Glasgow man though and though. There is a lot no mean city stereotypes but within these books they work well.

This book is great follow up to the previous with a fresh new plot threaded though previous, at time there is a feeling of cut and paste writing which stops the books being in the class of writing as both William and Liam McIvanney but it good all the same and less cut and paste than a certain Mr Rankins work. I would like to see some loose ends from previous books explored a little more in the next novel but all in all I really enjoyed this addition to the series and I greatly look forward to the next six months….

Well this was not a disappointment Alan Parks at his best. The description of Glasgow in the 70’s spot on. All the old characters you have grown to love from the previous five books appear as full blooded as ever.
I loved the pace of the book, Harry McCoy and Wattie with their banter. The gangster Stevie Cooper who I feel is a loveable rogue. The plot involves a serial killer targeting the down and outs in the city and the highs and lows of the personal crisis of McCoy. All with a background of police corruption going on in the city.
All together a well paced thriller and a compelling read.

Book 6# in the popular Detective Harry McCoy series - Tartan noir at its best.

McCoy and his partner Wattie are temporarily seconded to a station across the other side of Glasgow, when a distraught woman walks in to report her young son missing - the problem is, there are no records whatsoever that he even exists!

A second investigation involves a spate of poisonings amongst the homeless, and this is something close to the heart of McCoy, as his alcoholic father has lived on Glasgow’s streets for many years.

McCoy is one tough cop, and he doesn’t just break the rules, he totally demolishes them, but don’t let that fool you, he’s vulnerable, he’s hurting - and it’s a pain that’s been his partner since childhood, “a hole in the middle of him - so big, even all the drink he can get down him won’t fill it up.”

Despite the dark, grim, and gritty storylines, the Glaswegian sense of humour always lifts this series to another level. Recommended.

4+
DI Harry McCoy #6 - May/June 1975, Glasgow
McCoy is asked to attend a potential crime scene on waste ground where a man’s body has been found by two boys. It’s a victim known to McCoy, that of Jamie MacLeod aka Govan Jamie, a down and out hardened drinker. His death is deemed as natural causes, a hard life lived to excess. However, when similar victims turn up McCoy is on the case and very concerned for his father, also a member of this community. In addition, Judith West whose husband is pastor at the Church of Christ’s Suffering comes to the station to report her nine year old son missing. There seems to be more to this hardline church than meets the eye. McCoy has a lot on his plate as per usual especially as he’s been seconded to Possil Station where he is about as welcome as Typhoid Mary.

Alan Parks is up there with the very best crime writers and the character of McCoy is also one of the best creations, not just within Tartan Noir but much wider afield. He absolutely fascinates me and continues to do so. He treads a wavy ambiguous line between right and wrong especially via his friendship with OCG head Stevie Cooper but McCoy cares about the people no one else does which is particularly evident here. These people trust him and overall, he does do good even if he has his own brand of innovative solutions. As usual, the plot is packed with everything from the aforementioned cases to corruption and being caught between rocks and hard places. There’s retaliation and reputation, separation of truth from lies and inevitably all hell breaks looses with equally inevitable violent consequences. It escalates to a very good ending and a distinct sense of unfinished business.

Yet again alongside the character of McCoy stands the character of the city of Glasgow of this era. It’s grit, grit and more grit, a city crying out for renovation and tough like no other. It adds to the grim tone and is described with pinpoint accuracy and in the context of the times. This is the world that McCoy bestrides, tough just like him.

Whilst the plot of this latest instalment is without doubt we’ll constructed and it definitely keeps you immersed it’s not quite as fast paced as May God Forgive which leaves you breathless. Nonetheless it’s still a very good book and one I can recommend to fans of the genre. It can easily be read as a stand-alone but why miss out on this great series!!!

With thanks to NetGalley and especially to Canongate for the much appreciated arc in return for an honest review.

Dies hier ist der 6. Teil der Harry-McCoy-Serie, es ist erst Juni, und in Glasgow tobt das Verbrechen. Ich habe die ersten drei Teile (Januar-März) gelesen, und war schwer begeistert, also war ich echt wild auf die Fortsetzung(en). Vielleicht generell erstmal ein paar Sätze zur Serie: wir sind im Jahre 1975, Schottland, und begleiten den Detective Inspector Harry McCoy bei seinen Ermittlungen. McCoy ist special, eher ein Underdog, ein Haudegen, der keiner Schlägerei aus dem Weg geht, dessen bester Kumpel aus Kindertagen Stevie Cooper eine der aufstrebenden Größen der Glasgower Unterwelt ist, und der aus unterprivilegierten Schichten stammt. Aber er ist clever, und hat sich den Ruf erworben, ein guter Polizist zu sein.
Das Setting der Serie ist eher „noir“, wie ich in einer Rezension so schön gelesen habe, sprich ungeschönt brutal realistisch, vielleicht sogar etwas zu hart. Die Bücher sind auf jeden Fall immer eine Sightseeingtour in die eher unschönen Ecken der Stadt. „Bloody and brilliant“ nannte die Presse diese Serie, und genauso habe ich das bislang auch gefeiert.
Okay, soviel mal zu den generellen Eckdaten. In Band 6 nun hat McCoy – eigentlich wie gewohnt – gleich mehrere Baustellen vor sich. Mit seinem Detective Wattie zusammen ist er an eine andere Station versetzt worden, um dort undercover Korruptionsverdacht nachzugehen. Gleichzeitig sterben reihenweise alte Alkoholiker in der Stadt. McCoy ist der erste, der eine Mordserie vermutet, und er ist einer der wenigen, die es überhaupt interessiert, dass diese Zielgruppe ins Visier genommen wird: sein eigener Vater lebt auch alkoholabhängig auf der Straße. Dann gibt es noch gleich zwei Tote, die mit einer merkwürdigen Kirchengemeinde in Zusammenhang stehen, und in einem weiterem Erzählstrang hält Kumpel Stevie die Welt in Atem mit seinen Plänen, der nächste lokale Pate zu werden. Also, für genügend Action ist gesorgt, und was mich erneut fasziniert hat, ist wie diese vielen Puzzleteile am Ende ein stimmiges Ganzes ergeben, und McCoy die Fäden zusammenbringt.
So, und jetzt muss ich leider sagen: mich hat es dieses Mal nicht so gepackt. Die raue Stimmung, das Setting: spannend wie immer. Die Fälle: cool gemacht, auch wie immer. Die Hauptfiguren: die haben mich leider etwas verloren. Ich fand bei McCoy immer dieses raue Schale – weicher Kern – Prinzip so ansprechend. Der etwas abgehalfterte Detective, der gerne selbst entschieden hat, ob das Verbrechen offiziell aufgeklärt wird, und Gnade vor Recht hat ergehen lassen. Tja, und irgendwie habe ich das Gefühl, McCoy verliert gerade seinen moralischen Kompass. Bzw. er verliert sich selbst. Der ganze Sumpf um ihn herum scheint ihn zu verschlingen. Gefühlt war er nur noch versoffen, auf illegalen Touren unterwegs, und in Depressionen versunken. Nur noch als egoistisches A***** unterwegs – und sorry, mir gingen hier im Laufe des Buches meine Sympathien flöten. Am Ende ganz auf den letzten Seiten scheint McCoy sich zu überlegen, ob er nicht ganz die Seiten wechseln soll – tja nu, da muss ich sagen, das mag vielleicht realistisch sein, aber für mich hat sich die Serie dann erledigt. Als literarischer Held hat McCoy dann für mich ausgedient. Tja schade.
Sein Detective Wattie hatte leider weniger Raum als sonst, was ich ebenfalls schade fand; Wattie war mir immer sehr sympathisch. Aber selbst der verliert sein Vertrauen langsam aber sicher in McCoy, und das fand ich bedauerlich.
Nun ja.
Ein paar Worte noch zur Sprache / Übersetzung: Die ersten Bände habe ich auf Deutsch gelesen, und muss sagen, die Übersetzungen waren brillant, sie haben das Feeling, das Setting genau eingefangen. Das kann ich jetzt so feststellen, nachdem ich auch mal ein Original gelesen habe. Die Bücher sind generell recht dialoglastig, das macht es sehr lebendig, aber es wird natürlich auch viel Umgangssprache verwendet, und da bin ich als Nicht-Muttersprachlerin manchmal echt ins Stocken geraten, seit langem habe ich mal wieder ein paar Begriffe gegoogelt (panda cars? Polizeiautos, lol!). Das machte das Lesen für mich aber durchaus interessant, ich meine das nicht negativ. Ist jetzt aber lesetechnisch streckenweise nichts zum nebenbei durch-suchten gewesen.
Mein Fazit: Coole Story, gut erzählt, aber mit einem Helden, der sich für mich langsam selbst erledigt. Die mir noch fehlenden Teile 4 und 5 werde ich bei Gelegenheit noch lesen, aber ob ich weiterhin dranbleibe? Ich glaube eher nicht.
Herzlichen Dank an den Verlag und an Netgalley für das Rezensionsexemplar!

Harry McCoy is an excellent character, an old style police officer, well suited to the rough and tumble of the mean streets of Glasgow. Having previously enjoyed his wanderings on the banks of the Clyde, this book was a ‘must read’ and, as expected, it didn’t disappoint.
If you enjoy Scottish crime, more so covering a period from a few decades ago, this is for you.
Recommend.