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Chapters (45)
  1. The Man With No Face
  2. Also by
  3. Title
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Epigraph
  7. Contents
  8. INTRODUCTION
  9. CHAPTER ONE
  10. CHAPTER TWO
  11. CHAPTER THREE
  12. CHAPTER FOUR
  13. CHAPTER FIVE
  14. CHAPTER SIX
  15. CHAPTER SEVEN
  16. CHAPTER EIGHT
  17. CHAPTER NINE
  18. CHAPTER TEN
  19. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  20. CHAPTER TWELVE
  21. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  22. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  23. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  24. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  25. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  26. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  27. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  36. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  37. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

When my editor at Quercus suggested we republish, I read it again for the first time in decades and was struck by just how topical the subject matter and setting were in the context of today’s world.

The story takes place in the winter of 1979. The setting is Brussels. The backdrop is a British general election, and a political debate about Britain’s membership of the European Union.

I was struck, too, by its sense of noir (not dissimilar to the Scandi Noir of today), of murders in the bleak midwinter of a snowbound city, as well as cultural observations that belonged to their time and have long since passed into history. I am speaking of milk bottles on doorsteps. Of typewriters rather than computers. Of a pre-internet, pre-mobile-phone age when the flow of information was infinitely slower.

The political landscape has changed, too. In 1979 the apartheid government in South Africa was regarded as an international pariah, with sanctions imposed upon it by the United Nations. So, too, the illegal régime of Ian Smith in neighbouring Rhodesia, which was soon to become the independent state of Zimbabwe.

One of the characters in the book is an autistic child. In the forty years since it was written there have been many advances in the understanding and treatment of this condition. What appears in the book is a reflection of prevailing opinion at the time.

I undertook what I would describe as a light revision of the text ahead of publication, and found myself having a dialogue with my 27-year-old self. I am sure that the younger me might have taken issue with some of the (very minor) changes I made, but in the end forty years of life and writing experience took precedence.

Finally, I have to say that I am delighted with The Man With No Face, and I very much hope that you will enjoy it, too.

Peter May

France, 2018

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

Kale watched the train through the rain-spattered glass and thought, this time will be the last. But even as the thought formed in his mind it clotted and he knew he would kill again.

He twirled his cigarette nervously between nicotine-stained fingers and sipped the sour dregs of his coffee. The coffee machine on the counter hissed and issued steam, and with the rain beginning to fall outside the window was misting over. The first drops of condensation formed and ran clear lines through it.