Biologically Active Peptides

This is an impressive second novel from Sarah May, following her acclaimed debut, The Nudist Colony. Set in the faded splendour of Setton, once north-east Englands leading resort, this is the story of Hal, a chronic under-achiever, who plods from a promising start at the grammar school through uneventful service in World War II and on to life as a teacher. The focus for his drab life is the towns pleasure emporium, Spanish City, built by an entrepreneur in the post-war boom. It is here, once a week, that Hal dons his dancing shoes and allows himself an escape from his humdrum existence. After a few years, there begins an inexorable drift back to Setton of acquaintances from his army days, culminating in the arrival of the enigmatic and bewitching Stella, whose resurrections from not one but two untimely deaths provide the catalyst for a tragic chain of events. The plot is rich and intriguing, studded with wonderful episodes of black comedy and underpinned by an ever-present sense of the macabre. In life the characters look to the resident fortune-teller, Irene, to try to make sense of their muddled existences, and in death they look for reassurance to the calming influence of the linchpin of the community, Hals cousin Raymond. As Co-operative funeral director, it is he who witnesses Stellas resurrections and who therefore holds the key to the unfolding tragedy. The crowning irony of the book lies in the fact that Raymonds highly successful funeral business outlives not only the spectacular enterprise of Spanish City and the dreams embodied in it, but most of the characters as well. This is a highly enjoyable read, containing as it does all those vital elements of tragicomedy - love and hatred, humour and sadness and, above all, life and death themselves. (Kirkus UK)