Mr Punch

 I've been reading Christopher Fowler's blog for a while now (at www.christopherfowler.co.uk) and enjoying it, so I thought it was about time I read one of his Bryant and May mysteries, about two elderly coppers in the Peculiar Crimes Unit.  The first one I found was Bryant & May and The Memory of Blood, which I think is quite late in the series.

It concerns Mr Punch - or at least a series of murders on a Punch and Judy theme, which leads Bryant into researching the history of the Punch and Judy show.

I was already fairly familiar with the history of Punch and Judy - Mr Punch is the villain in the first Rivers of London book by Ben Aaronovitch, and turns up here and there in the later books of the series, though in the Bryant and May book no real magic is involved.  I was surprised, though, that in all the discussions of the traditional characters and puppets used in Punch and Judy shows, the crocodile was never mentioned - I remember the crocodile very clearly from when I used to watch the Punch and Judy show on Blackpool beach.  The booth was built into the back of a van that drove up and down the sands, stopping at intervals to do the show:

This is what I remember - the picture was taken in 1963.

 There are digressions into the history of the building used by the PCU - once used by Alistair Crowley, and with a fairground booth automaton of Madame Blavatsky in the attic, and theatre history, as the suspects are all part of the cast and crew of a new play at a recently re-opened London theatre, and that was all fascinating.  I tend to be more interested in the background details of a murder plot, rather than the whodunit aspect.  There's also a B-plot which starts off as something quite commonplace (woman has troublesome neighbours) and ends up being a lot more sinister, and personal to Bryant.  There were also some very funny moments, mostly involving Bryant.

I'm going to be looking out for more Bryant and May stories now.