The Tailor (DS Cross Mysteries #8) by Tim Sullivan Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, ebook, audiobook
Genres: crime thriller, mystery
Series: DS George Cross #8
Pages: 368
Published by Atlantic Crime on August 11, 2026
Purchasing Info: Author's Website, Publisher's Website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Bookshop.org, Better World Books
Goodreads
The unfailingly shrewd and uniquely brilliant DS George Cross is back...
'Every generation has its iconic detective - Holmes, Poirot and Morse - but Cross is emerging as the one for now.'
DAILY MAIL
'One of my favourite detectives.' ELLY GRIFFITHS
THE KILLING A bespoke tailor boards the 9:26 train from Bristol to London. Before it even reaches Bath, his body is found slumped lifeless in the toilet. The police initially assume it’s a robbery.
THE CRIME But the truth is more complicated than that. Why was the man found with a plastic bag over his head? Why was his throat cut in such a savage way? DS George Cross realises that this was no mugging - it was an organised hit.
THE END This realisation forces George into a merciless, unfamiliar world – and is it his imagination or is he being followed?
Everyone knows that DS George Cross is tenacious, that he always gets to the truth. It seems, this time, someone will do anything to stop that from happening…
Perfect for fans of MW Craven, Ann Cleeves and Joy Ellis, this is the eighth book in the million-copy-bestselling George Cross Mystery series, which can be read in any order.
My Review:
It’s interesting that the character of DS George Cross that we met back in The Dentist was extremely, well, let’s call it change-averse. And that’s an understatement. Yet, the DS Cross in The Tailor very much HAS changed – even if he doesn’t recognize just how much.
Just as he doesn’t realize how much his colleagues at the Avon and Somerset Police have come to both like and respect him. No matter how much or how often he drives them round the twist. Which is very often indeed.
One of the interesting things about this case, the murder of a tailor while on the train between Temple Meads – near Bristol – and Bath Spa, is one of the rare cases where the victim was actually an excellent member of his profession in good standing. As opposed to the sort of louse who usually ends up as the titular character of each entry in this series.
William “Billy” Titcomb was both an excellent bespoke tailor and seemingly a rather “good egg” as the Brits say. He inherited a family business, he was good at the work and at respecting the work of others, and his company was generally successful, the pandemic downturn notwithstanding. He’s a family man with a wife and two kids and seemingly no skeletons whatsoever in his closet. (Although his wife’s closet may be another matter entirely.)
But someone slit his throat in a train carriage W/C, stole his luggage – including two bespoke suits – and then disappeared. It looks like it was a professional hit. At first, the question the investigation needs to answer is why. The more complicated that answer starts to look, and the more Cross’ DCI interferes with the investigation, the more the real question starts to look like which profession?
Cross is determined – as he always is – to get all the answers. Even if some of those answers are wrapped in the Official Secrets Act, and others are tainted by betrayal from within.
Escape Rating A: It’s no secret that I’ve been reading this series from beginning to end, and that I’ve loved every single book in it, from The Dentist all the way to this most anticipated eighth book, The Tailor. I expected Cross and company to sweep me back to their patch from the very first page, and that’s exactly what happened. This was pretty much of a one-sitting book for me, (which Luna appreciated very much!)
As always, I was captivated both by following Cross’ thought-processes into plumbing the depths of the mystery, while, at the very same time, doing his damndest to barely skim the surface of the many changes in his own life.
Cross deals with change badly and emotions, both his own and those of the people around him, worse. He’s a creature of meticulous attention, focused to the point of hyperfocus, with a need to get straight to the point with no consciousness whatsoever of what are referred to as the “social niceties”. His autism spectrum disorder aids greatly in his work – as long as he has a partner who can supply the social oils and unguents that Cross sees no purpose in. (He might be right but that’s the way the world – and other people – work.
His work on this case is a bit distracted because he’s faced with changes that he doesn’t want to deal with. His former partner, the former DS Ottey, is now a DI. She’s switched roles from being his equal to being his superior, and he’s not dealing with it all that well. (In some ways, neither is she, as being a DI seems to mean more paperwork and less actual policing.)
Cross’ new partner is newly minted DC Alice Mackenzie. He’s worked with Alice before, back when she was on staff but not a detective, so she knows how to work with – and occasionally around – Cross. But he does NOT enjoy being a boss, of her or anyone else, and now he is. Whether he likes it or not.
Then there’s this case, which is a bit different in the way it works, and twice as twisted as normal. Because it’s not just a murder. It’s not even ABOUT the murder, strictly speaking. The case, and that poor, departed tailor, are neck deep in the “secret services”. And nothing that touches that murky cesspool of dirty secrets is EVER straightforward. George Cross is the last police detective that MI6 wanted assigned to this case – so they do their best/worst to delay and derail him at every turn.
That combination, of the case that twists and turns and turns both itself and the police inside out kept me glued to a succession of seats for nearly four hours straight. While the shifts in George Cross’ life, and the way that he does and does not adapt to them, turned into one shining moment of awesome that I could acknowledge even if Cross himself could not.
The events of this case, and the changes in Cross’ life and work that arise out of time and circumstance, have PLENTY of implications for the next book in the series to deal with. I’m just pleased as punch that the next book has been announced and scheduled for publication in June 2027 in the US, a mere two months after the UK release. There’s no title as yet but that doesn’t matter. I’m just glad that George Cross will be back. I’ll just have to find something to tide me over while I wait!
One thought on “Grade A #BookReview: The Tailor by Tim Sullivan”