9 Tail Fox - Jon Courtenay Grimwood

Anyone who's read recent Jon Courtenay Grimwood fiction will know to expect some crime aspect to his fiction, however 9 Tail Fox is a crime novel , albeit with a SF concept at its core. The blurb doesn't even mention Science Fiction so perhaps this is an attempt to break out of the SF genre?

The writing is great, the characters perfectly realised and the city, San Francisco, is described wonderfully, you get a real sense of place and feel. The plot is quite simple on the surface and complicated underneath, clues dropped here and there. I have to say I had completely failed to work out what was going on when the ending revealed all. Maybe that's just my inexperience with crime novels?

At the end, all though I enjoyed it, I felt a little disappointed that it wasn't more SF. Overall I prefer Pashazade. But if you want a cool, stylish crime novel with an SF twist then you probably won't find any better.