Don t Cry For Me Aberystwyth 
Client Evaluari: - Does something different from what it says on the Tin. I bought the first of the Aberystwyth books recently because the cover reminded me of Jasper Fforde s Nursery Crime series, and he hasn t finished any new books lately. I wasn t disappointed: a completely ludicrous plot, set in an alternative unreality, but which is nevertheless very enjoyable with characters who are engaging. I didn t think the second was quite as good, though it would probably make a better choice as a Christmas present for an elderly Welsh relative. I haven t read the third yet, but didn t find that mattered much here.
This book has the word Hilarious on the front cover. I certainly didn t find it so - and the book was a little too dark and violent for me in places. But, overall, I enjoyed it more than either of the other two I have read. In parts it was more like a serious literary novel than a pastiche, and in those parts I found it was often more interesting and thought provoking than some supposedly important books.
- Merely Entertaining. Ok, now I have read all Louie Knight books, well the ones that have been published so far.
I find a common problem to them all. Number one, Pryce is going to get stuck with the same characters. The baddies have been the baddies for the last four books. Ideally, I would like to see the series develop into some sort of Discworld set up, a hard thing to do with seven characters, and that s including the secondary actors.
Secondly, I wonder if anyone has bothered explaining Hitchcock s Macguffin theory to Mr Pryce. Sometimes you just want to be left wondering what was it that Santa had hidden in the locker. The author feels compelled to answer every question, every mistery. The four novels keep veering off on parallel stories about the Patagonia war that have little value for the general unravelling of the plot, this one in particular.
So will I read the next one scheduled for release next year? Yes, but purely for completeness sake, however, if Mrs Llantrisant and Herod Jenkins still feature prominently. If there are more subplots on the Patagonia war, I will have reached my Aberystwyth limit. - Beautifully Noir. These books are funny in a League of Gentlemen type way, deeply disturbing, macabre and with a strong vein of tragedy through them all. The quality of the writing is excellent. The creation of a fabulously fictitious world based in our reality is much like Jasper Fforde, but Pryce s work is darker and his style is more sparse and philosophical. Having lived in Lampeter, which gets a mention in the books more than once and knowing the area very well it heightens the comedic aspects more than if you didn t know where these places where and what they are like for real. Having said that, the books are still rich and rewarding within themselves. Louie is a strong character who has that wonderful gumshoe quality which makes him so appealingly retro and it s wonderful to see his father and Sospan again.
- Darker - but darkly funny too. Unlike the other reviewers below I thought this the funniest of the four by a long way, but, like the story, the humour is darker and rather than dancing in front of you like a showgirl in a stovepipe hat, this time it hits you like lead pipe to the back of the neck.
The prose itself is first rate: taut and economical and for all that this series started out, ostensibly at least, as a pastiche, the plot and conception of Don t Cry for me Aberystwyth is finally revealing this series to be a surrealistic masterpiece. - Don t Laugh For Me Aberystwyth. When you look at the ingredients of this book - dead Santas, Nazi hunters, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the Welsh Secret Service - you d be forgiven for assuming it to be a deranged work of bewildering surrealism. Malcolm Pryce, however, has the knack of making the bizarre seem believable - the oddness never hinders the plot and thus you re left with a genuinely gripping and inventive thriller populated with some undeniably unusual yet never ludicrous characters.
Much of the success of this series is down to Pryce s prose which is brilliantly evocative and leaves many better-known writers in the shade. In an ideal world Pryce would be as big as Pratchett.
One niggle - the Louie Knight books are promoted as comedies (the jacket describes this one as hilarious) but they ve never been over-burdened with laughs and, as other reviewers have mentioned, this volume is darker still. A little less introspection and a few more laughs would be nice next time.
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Don t Cry For Me Aberystwyth (ID: 0747593175)
