Trace and Eliminate — Keith Wright

September 1987The internet is yet to be born and the cell phone is over twenty years from its inception. A packet of cigarettes costs £1.60 and a loaf of bread is 40p.  Margaret Thatcher has just won a record third term as Prime Minister and 'Never Gonna Give You Up' by Rick Astley is number 1 in the Charts.Some things don't change; however, greed, love, jealousy, and a knife sliding through a carotid artery tend to have the same impact on people's lives as they ever did.In the second of The Inspector Stark series, DI Stark and his team battle to solve a murder which appears to be without motive. DI Stark also battles with his anxiety; DC Charlie Carter battles his hemorrhoids and DPW Steph Dawson battles with her Sergeants advances.An up-and-coming solicitor lies on a mortuary slab. He is a hard-working family man who appears to have everything. Who would want to kill him? The ruthless and savage killer, who knows precisely why; remains at large.Detective Inspector Stark and the team have scarcely begun their investigation when a second death occurs: another horrific and motiveless murder, or so it seems.  Are the two linked?  Are more going to die?  How can they be stopped? A group of suspects emerges, one is the killer, and one the next to die.Stark's investigation eventually lays bare a sinister sequence of events, a motive where the past returns to haunt the present – a roller coaster ride of hate, fuelled by revenge.Stark stages a most original eavesdrop on a solemn occasion, and the police net closes in on an unexpected killer.Trace and Eliminate 'combines the virtues of an insider's knowledge with the dramatic power of a true storyteller'.