'DI Joe Faraday is down in the dumps. His lover, Eadie Sykes, has moved to Australia, and Joe's back in Portsmouth. Then there's a new case. A man is found, chopped in half. And that ain't all. Violence is in the air and it spills over on Joe's troops in the worst way.
Hurley is one of the great talents of British police procedurals. Every book he delivers is better than the last and this is no exception. I can't recommend it highly enough.'
Mark Timlin, Independent on Sunday, 28 January 2007
'There is no one writing better police procedurals today than Graham Hurley. His Portsmouth-based series no longer carries 'A Joe Faraday book' tag line; DC Paul Winter, who made an impact right from the first book, now firmly shares centre stage with DI Faraday. One Under further develops their personalities, particularly that of Winter, recently back at work after an operation on his near-fatal brain tumour.The book begins with a horrifying death: a man chained to a railway line is mown down by a train. Identification is at first impossible and by the time the police discover who he was, Winter has found the name of someone else on the missing persons list and started an enthusiastic - and unauthorised - investigation of his own. In other hands the minutiae of a police investigation might make dull reading, but Hurley, an experienced documentary film maker, gives an almost cinematic quality to his narrative, creating a convincing sense of watching a team of real detectives at work.'
Susanna Yager, Daily Telegraph, 24 January 2007
What makes Hurley’s series unique, and by extension lifts him beyond many of his contempories is the realist way in which detective work is portrayed. If you’re looking for a procedural series led by a maverick cop with no respect for the law itself, then this series may not be the one for you. DI Faraday is a modern detective who, as a matter of course, has to juggle internal political pressure serious criminal investigations. Consistent with the previous titles in the series, One Under doesn’t shy away from addressing difficult questions of contemporary British society, with Portsmouth being evocatively brought to life. Hurley draws on a sense of place to flavour the story, and here we see the lines being blurred between the rich and the poor, the good and the bad, and all neatly brought together in the form of the police’s long-term target, cocaine dealer turned property developer, Barry MacKenzie. Unlike with the majority of crime writing, you’re never sure if those responsible are ultimately going to be held to account, simply because that’s the harsh reality of the world that Faraday and many other detectives inhabit. Rather than being a traditional ‘page turner’, One Under creeps up on you and exerts a more satisfying grip. Slower paced than most modern police procedurals, the small victories for Faraday and his team are that bit harder won and all the more satisfying for it. One Under is no less exciting for this approach, because it’s balanced out by a sense of unrelenting realism that is never less than thoughtfully presented by the author.’
Excerpt from review in SHOTS MAGAZINE by Nick Quantrill January 2007
'Graham Hurley's One Under is definitely not for the faint-hearted, beginning with the grim discovery of a body torn apart under the wheels of a moving train. DI Joe Faraday is assigned to investigate, but with no identity, progress is slow. Colleage DC Winter is also involved, but is side-tracked by what appears to be another mystery involving a missing person. Both gritty and realistic with remarkable attention to detail, this is not a novel to be read late at night.'
Crime Round-Up, Waterstone's Books Quarterly, January 2007
'A first-rate thriller, which is graphic and gritty and will hit you right in the stomach from the very start.'
Peterborough Evening Telegraph
'The title of Graham Hurley's latest police procedural refers to the gruesome early scenes when an early-morning train out of Portsmouth runs over a body in a tunnel. One Under appears to have two crimes at its core - the murder of the man who was chained to the railway line, and the disappearance of another, which looks suspiciously like a murder, but with no body to show for it. In the previous book we saw Winter on the verge of a serious operation. He's back almost to fighting fitness, but with a lot of issues to deal with, including his relationship with high-class call girl Maddox. One Under is really his book. He's left at the end with an ethical/unethical call that will leave you pondering long after you've set the book aside. Now Winter is a great creation - the kind of old-fashioned maverick cop who gets results and, despite the reactions he garners from colleagues, you know he's the sort of policeman they'd secretly like to be. Also in the books' favour is the setting. Portsmouth, on the south coast of England, becomes almost like a character in its own right.
One Under is a majestic book. It's immaculately-plotted, has a strong character to anchor it, and shows police work in all its graft and frustrations.
Excerpt from reviewingtheevidence.com by Sharon Wheeler, December 2006
