Just bought this battered old first edition, which nicely came with this tatty book-plate inside…

I wonder who Hilde Ritter and Hanni were…

In homage to spending Xmas in the most inhospitable place in the world (that’a Northern England in case you don’t know), here’s the most appropriate thing I could find…

If I’m honest my preference is still towards Tim’s shorter fiction. I think Tim’s prose is at its best in the shorter form, which I don’t think is in anyway an insult. Indeed, his short work is much better than all the recently published horror I’ve read lately (who I will mention: Gary Fry and Mark Samuels), although this might just be my own recent leanings towards the short story over the novel in recent months. I still would like to see Tim’s short work published by someone other than himself and online fiction magazines… maybe one day… Anyway, despite the originality of a prison-based fantasy novel concept, I’m not totally convinced by the prison side of Thief (I must confess that I’m not a fan of the prison genre at all, so maybe this shouldn’t be surprising) and, alas, I don’t think Tim manages to avoid all the prison archetypes and devises that I really don’t really enjoy – although there would appear to be a homage to Porridge with one of the Thief’s characters called Fletcher, which is a nice touch. However, this might well not be a problem for most people (judging by the inexplicable success of the Shawshank Redemption anyway). Indeed, maybe Tim might have hit the motherload with this one!

While the prison story inside a fantasy novel is unique,  the underclass hero destined to rise up against the tyranny of a nameless overlord is possibly less so… but despite this I can’t think of anything that I’ve read that is quite like Thief… which can only be a good sign! I think Thief could well appeal to fan’s of Moorcock, although less epic, or Peake, but less baroque, (both of which I love) or maybe China Meiville, but less overtly fantastically weird, (who I’d like to like but feel is vastly overrated), although it’s not necessarily similar to any of them… it kind of reminds me of a fairy tale although I’m not sure why… Hmmm… I’m being a bit vague here… The Thief might be a little low-key to some fantasy reader’s tastes, yet personally this approach appeals to me more these days, so it might well appeal to you too… Anyway,  the Thief is a good read and more a bit different than your usual fantasy fare. More importantly, it shows promise for the future too, so I wish Tim all the luck with this his latest endevour.

One thing I must mention is the physical quality of Tim’s publications. The art work is, as ever, fantastic. Lovely pencil rendering inside and an evocative cover picture with great use of chiaroscuro. I’m not sure who is responsible for said artwork, as I could find no credit on the cover, so I must assume that it is from Tim’s fair hand (I’m sure he did an art degree) – anyway, beautiful stuff whoever is responsible. I find that it’s always a pleasure to find illustrations in a book and these are great.

Anyway, to cut to the quick: if you haven’t read Tim Jeffrey’s stuff before I’d still suggest his short collection The Garden Where Black Flowers Grow or pretty much any of his audiobooks (especially: The Secret Season or Garden…),then (if you dig that) either this or The Orange Grove could be good places to go if you want to delve deeper. Or if a subtle and low-key fantasy novel is your bag, then why not get yourself convicted and have a 200-odd page stretch (no time off for good behaviour, sonny) and buy yourself a copy of the Thief’s Return.

For some reason WordPress doesn’t like me using a dongle so I can’t post any artwork or links, so copy/past this in your browse and have a looksee…

http://timjeffreyswriter.webs.com/thethiefnovels.htm