Review: Blondie, Glasgow gangsters, war criminals and 5 mins to live | Books | Entertainment

The Other Side of the Dream by Clem Burke, Hardback, £25

Growing up in a working-class town in New Jersey, it was almost inevitable that the Keith Moon-obsessed Clem Burke would find himself at ground zero of New York’s punk scene in underground clubs like CBGBs and Max’s Kansas City alongside the likes of Television, the Ramones and the New York Dolls. Having answered a Village Voice ad from Debbie Harry and Chris Stein in 1975, he was soon drumming with the nascent Blondie.

Their rise was fast and left casualties but this fabulous posthumous memoir (Burke died last year aged 70) zips along like one of Burke’s signature drum patterns without getting bogged down in rock cliches. A greatest hits of the times. 8/10

Rat Race by Callum McSorley, Hardback, £16.99

Like the illegitimate offspring of Irvine Welsh, Chris Brookmyre and Kathy Lette, Callum McSorley’s funny, dark and violent take on gangland Glasgow has made him one of Britain’s most exciting new crime writers. In the third in his loosely-linked trilogy, DCI Alison ‘Ali’ McCoist is struggling to save her career following the fallout from Squeaky Clean (2023) and Paperboy (2025) when she’s put in charge of solving a gangland massacre.

She’s soon on the trail of drug dealer turned marathon runner Fran Forbes who’s been dragged back into criminal capers to pay for a knee op! Fabulous characters, inventive swearing and stacks of gallows humour, the criminal underworld has rarely been so much fun. 9/10

Five by Ilona Bannister, Hardback, £16.99

A gambler, an old woman, a businessman, a mother and her child are waiting at a suburban train station at 7.01am for the 7.06am to London Victoria. Five passengers, five minutes to the next train, five minutes until one of them will die. As the train gets closer and the clock ticks down, each of their stories are revealed and the reader is challenged to decide which of the five ‘deserves’ to die – before their fate is revealed.

With a killer hook and sharply observed commentary on human flaws, resilience and hope, this highly original thriller kept this reader enthralled while frantically turning the pages and deeply moved by the end. 9/10

Martin’s Eyes by Iain Ballantyne, Hardback, £25

It is Austria 1946 and, in a remote hunting lodge, two men are facing off over a bottle of pear schnapps. One is a fugitive former SS officer and the other a British military policeman and war crimes investigator who sends men like his drinking companion to the gallows. As they share war stories, it remains to be seen which one of them will walk away.

Ballantyne is an acclaimed military historian specialising in the Royal Navy and his splendidly atmospheric debut novel shines with authenticity. Set amid the ruins of Europe, it plunges readers back into the greatest and most terrible war of the 20th century. Gripping, powerful and deeply moving. 8/10