michael robotham's 2004 novel the suspect

Set in the UK, where Robotham was then working, the novel introduces an unlikely pair of protagonists – psychiatrist Joseph O’Loughlin, a complex, difficult man facing a future with Parkinson’s Disease, and Vincent Ruiz, a serving police detective, more personally relaxed, and quietly very good at his job. The Suspect, the first of the O’Loughlin and Ruiz series, was released in 2004. He’s done the same thing with earlier novels – in the other stand-alone, Bombproof, and in the acclaimed O’Loughlin and Ruiz series. It comes as no surprise that the ‘grand master of suspense’ can craft a story like this, or that Robotham, an Australian, can set this story deep in the American countryside and make it read, feel and sound exactly as if it came from a writer from that area. Part thriller, part jailbreak, part outlaw on the run, Life or Death is also a love story and a classic take on the man-against-the-machine scenario. It then took many years to come up with an answer, and the confidence to tell the story, but what a story it is. Why, I asked myself, what could possibly be the reason?’ ‘I read a newspaper account of a man who had served a long prison sentence, but escaped the day before he was due to be released.

Robotham’s renowned for taking a snippet from real life and building his novels around the ‘what if’ questions that tweak his interest, and he does so again in Life or Death: More importantly, it’s the book that I was meant to write.’

It’s a love story and a prison story and a heart-stopping account of one man’s refusal to surrender. That’s why I’m so excited about Life or Death. ‘It took me years to come up with an answer and even longer before I felt I had the skills to tell the story properly. Michael Robotham’s latest novel, published ten years after his first, was more than 20 years in the making. One of Australia’s great storytellers: Michael Robotham’s crime fiction and the tantalising premise of his new novel. Tags: Australian crime fiction/ Michael Robotham Crime Scene: MICHAEL ROBOTHAM Life or Death.

Michael robotham's 2004 novel the suspect