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When I got over the beautiful cover sleeve and then removed it, and ogled at the more gorgeous gold cover, I eventually settled down to read. This is a book of two halves. A brilliant first half and a let-down of a second. The first half is true Chambers. Brutal, uncompromising, and disgustingly seedy. The second half, although not without its horrible moments, just did not live up to the first half. It just fell flat and nothing could cover up the holes in the plot. Kenny bond is The Family Man, we meet him banged up in wormwood scrubs, with devoted wife Sharon’s car knowing the route there and never missing a visit. Son Donnie who’s just starting out dating tansy a coppers daughter. That’s not going to go down well…. Daughter sherrie, and of course we meet Kenny’s mates, his mother and aunt, his in-laws. And as we’d expect outlaws, not rights and shit cunts.
No one, and I repeat, no one, in this novel appears to be straight. The whole cast are crooked, criminals, “chancers” if you life – all committing some form of deception and involved in a type of illegal activity. And if they don’t fall into this category, then they are off performing adultery: none of the characters appear to have a loyal bone in their body. Frustratingly, the females all fall under the male spell and are forever weak and in need of “saving” – sexually or physically. All in all, it felt so dated and cliched that this was one of the main reasons that the novel lost my interest. (This book was published last year, so I can only imagine that the retroactive attitudes are supposed to reflect Melissa’s traditional upbringing?) This was the first book I had read by this author and I enjoyed it. The story begins in 1975 when Kenny Bond finds himself in prison for killing a police officer. He has a wife, Sharon, and two children Donny and Sherry. It starts with him sharing some stories of prison life, sharing a cell with a gypsy, Tamplin, who he found out was a robber of pensioners, and he took matters into his own hands and saw him right for that one day. Finally Kenny gets parole and is released, and the book goes on to document the years as their family grows. Dragged up on a council estate, Jason Rampling was determined to change his lot. Jason’s a chancer, shameless with his good looks and his gift for earning a few quid. Life is easy when the money rolls in. Kimberly Chambers is a queen of gangland crime and needless to say, she has outdone herself with this novel. From the storyline to all the characters (and trust me there are so many), she wrote an outstanding mystery thriller based in the gangster world. Some may view crime thrillers as lowbrow compared to a lot of high-brow, anal retentive literature. The difference being that people actually love reading Kimberley Chambers work as she knows how to entertain, keep a reader, and not bore them to death. Chambers gives you a rollercoaster ride of a thriller that is gripping, breath-taking and a guide to the low life of Essex.Chambers was an extremely smart and gifted student in primary and secondary school. Her best subject was English. For reasons unknown, Chambers grades began to plummet. When she was eleven, she states that “things began to deteriorate.” After a few years, her academic life became so stark that she decided to leave her secondary school. Thank you to @randomthingstours for the slot on the tour and @harpercollinsuk for the beautiful copy of the book. I thoroughly enjoyed it 🥰 Chambers was born and brought up in Dagenham, Essex. [6] Her mother, Valerie, worked as a typist, and her father, Tom, was a steel erector. An only child, she attended John Perry Infants and Junior School and Dagenham Priory Comprehensive, but left without any O-Levels. [7] She worked as a market trader on a ladies’ fashion stall in the legendary Roman Road market in the East End. [8] She also worked as a pub DJ and as a mini-cab driver in Romford before writing her first novel, Billie Jo, at the age of 38. [9] [10] As of 2022 she now lives in Hornchurch. [11] Career [ edit ]
The epic new thriller from the No.1 bestselling Queen of Gangland crime!Kenny Bond. A murderer. A gangster. A good family man.Meet the Bonds Kimberley Chambers: My friends were married to villains". Metro. 24 November 2009 . Retrieved 18 June 2018. The accident relating to child abuse and rape crushed me. It was horrific to read and yet the author handled the incident perfectly.I don't usually books of this kind of genre. It's like a fictional biography of an East End mum and her family. I'm glad I took a punt on it because it was a fantastic read (but very gritty and hard hitting) and I couldn't put it down. Then the unthinkable happens, Vinny’s beautiful daughter Molly disappears. The Butler brothers depart on a frantic search for the little girl. They don’t know if their enemies have taken her, or if the kidnapping is revenge for what Vinny has done. The book is really well written, everything seems chaotic when we hear one story then straight onto another, but they do all make sense. Donny ends up having twins boys, Beau and Brett, with years later something terrible happening to one of them which is the course for some bad things occurring going forward. It's full of relationship dramas, blended families, mixed cultures, murders, lots of drama! It was good to read how the story came together with all the different characters, and if one thing is clear throughout the book is that Kenny is most definitely a family man, and will do anything....anything for his family. One thing he knows he needs to find a woman who has the ability to take on his daughter, Shay, be a mother to her and a wife to him. That would not be to hard with his good looks, but he has trouble keeping his pants on and other women have been known to take care of him in ways others can only dream of.
The story starts off with one very intriguing prologue told from Jason’s point of view introducing himself. I was left thinking OMG how different is this. We then follow his story of Life of Crime told from third person perspective.Where we meet some very different characters. Some that you will like and of course some that you wont like. It wouldn't be a Kimberly Chambers book if it didn't have some bad guys in it. A Life Of Crime is the story of Jason and Melissa Rampling, Jason wants a better life for his family than the one he had, and if that means breaking the law so be it, as Jason becomes more embroiled in the murky crime world, treachery, lies and violence become part of his every day life. Anyone who has ever read a book by Kimberley Chambers will not be surprised to hear there’s plenty of swearing in this book, personally I feel it adds authenticity to her characters and very much fits their personalities. One thing I love about this authors writing are her characters they are vibrant and larger than life, there are so many characters in Life Of Crime that I could write about, the good, the bad and the down right ugly but in doing so I would be in danger of giving away spoilers, what I will say love them or hate them Kimberley Chambers has created another set of characters that are memorable. The gifted novelist only has nine books, but her impact on London and around the world has been huge. Chambers has a three book series: The Traitor Chambers, Victim and The Feud. The series revolves around a long time feud between two families; the Mitchells and the O’Haras. It is true to life, I think. This book is how I picture how the East End was in the 70s, 80s and 90s. The language used in the book is true to life and there is no holds barred. I especially loved the relationship between Maureen and her mother-in-law, Ethel. Ethel was written as a stereotypical East End nan - racist, crass and not afraid to speak her mind.Kimberly offers us up a good old fashioned geezer then reminds us “men are like dogs, if they ain’t trained they’ll shit all over the carpet”
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