murder

PAST TIMES – OLD CRIMES . . . The Summer That Never Was

Yes, I know, I am cheating here. My PT-OC limit was supposed to be 2000, but I am making an exception here. After all, what is three years in a lifetime? In the lovely song Just A Song At Twilight, there is a phrase, “Once in the dear dead days beyond recall..”. I had those days, and back then, before publishers and authors trusted me with free copies of their novels, I was an inveterate user of our local public library. I mostly borrowed crime fiction, and I came to love the books of writers like Phil Rickman, Nick Oldham, Jonathan Kellerman, Jim Kelly and Peter Robinson. I quote another memorable song, “Some are dead and some are living..” and, sadly, Peter Robinson is one of the latter.

He is best remembered for his Inspector Banks novels, and I have chosen one of those for this feature. Banks, of course, does his coppering in the Yorkshire Dales, but this story takes him back to his childhood in Peterborough. Peterborough is, in some ways, a strange place. It has a majestic cathedral, was once in Northamptonshire, but now seems to be in Cambridgeshire. Like Banks in the novel, I remember it in the 1960s, when it was a grimy little town, surrounded by brickworks but, even then, a vital railway hub. I knew it from my days as a trainspotter, hair excessively Brylcreemed, and with a school satchel packed with sandwiches, fizzy pop and Ian Allen train books. Then came Peterborough’s designation as a New Town, with the massive expansion turning it into a kind of Milton Keynes, all roundabouts and fancifully named new housing estates.

Strangely, there is nothing in online information to suggest that Robinson was a youngster in Peterborough (he was born and brought up in Leeds) but then novelists make us believe things that actually never happened – that’s what they are good at. Here, Robinson creates a brilliant counterpoint, like two independent melodies dancing along together in perfect harmony, Banks, of course, is the link.

Down in Peterborough, a skeleton is discovered on a building site. It is that of a childhood friend of Banks, who disappeared when he was a teenager. Graham Marshall disappeared one morning while doing his paper round and, despite an extensive police investigation, no trace of him was ever found. Back in the present day, Banks’s offsider and onetime lover, Annie Cabbot is investigating the disappearance of Luke Armitage, a brooding and rather troubled youngster with celebrity parents. After what appears to be a fake kidnap-ransom demand, his body is found in a moorland tarn.

For Banks, with the aid of a resourceful Peterborough copper Michelle Hart, the solution to Graham Marshall’s murder involves a painful dismantling of what he remembers of an innocent friendship. The death of Luke Armitage involves individuals who, while innocent of malice, are certainly guilty of several of the Deadly Sins.

Banks, in his determination to secure justice for both boys, comes to realise that the boundaries between victim and perpetrator, between law guardian and law breaker can sometimes be blurred almost into indistinction. Faulkner said, in his memorable line from Requiem For A Nun, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past” and here, Banks’s return to the unremarkable Peterborough housing estate of his youth brings about not only the warmth of nostalgia brought about by the magazines and pop songs of his teenage years, but something darker and much more discomforting. I was haunted by the book when I first read it, not least because it chimed so perfectly with my recollections of pre New Town Peterborough, a city of hard graft, amazing LNER engines, and its no-nonsense terraced streets. I would propose that this novel, first published in 2003, is Peter Robinson’s masterpiece.

August 22, 2026 0

A SHROUD OF SNOW . . . Between the covers

Worcester, December 1145. Snow has dusted the frozen mud and filth of the streets, while the fringes of the city’s great artery, the River Severn, are beginning to freeze. Merchant Hamelin Isenmongere, apparently a benign and compassionate man from Gloucester, is found dead on the quayside, the side of his skull stove in by some heavy implement. No-one has a bad word to say about him. He was benevolent to the poor – including the child of the streets Godfilde (who will later play a significant part in the novel’s finale) – generous to the church, and dealt fairly with fellow traders in the city.

We are frequently reminded in this series that along with the turn of the seasons, and the implacable retreat and return of the sun, this was a society within which religious observance was deeply embedded. Early in the piece we are told that this is the third week of Advent. This season of the church’s year is a precious and significant time largely ignored these days, but one previously associated with great music and a sense of devotion.. A priest tells us that a woman, “did not come to Vespers, for her sons are still very small, but she came to Matins most days, and None sometimes.”

I am something of a lapsed Anglican and, of course, the religion of 12th century Worcester was the Roman Catholicism that was to endure for another four centuries, but the way in which the lives of rich and poor are underpinned by religious observances, both great and small is, somehow, comforting.

Readers of both authors may be surprised to find me likening Hawkswood to the great Noir writer Derek Raymond. The latter’s nameless sergeant, a relentless hunter of killers, does so as a service to the dead. Here, Bradecote, hunched over the body of a victim, whispers,
“A price will be paid for this, mistress.”
Like his twentieth century counterpart, Bradecote will avenge the dead, and he dedicates his labours to the lives – both noble and humble – that have been ended by acts of violence.

The English civil war of the 12th century smouldered – and occasionally burst into flames – for almost two decades. Stephen and Matilda were both grandchildren of William the Conqueror, and each claimed the throne. It has been in the background for all the Bradecote books, but here the question of dealings between noble supporters of the rival factions raises its head, causing Bradecote and his sergeants to tread very warily.

A particularly significant player in the civil war was Robert, Earl of Gloucester, the illegitimate son of Henry 1st and a fervent supporter of Matilda, and the city of Gloucester is just under 30 miles downstream in the river from Worcester. I don’t know if the Norman French version of cherchez la femme differs significantly from the modern version, but Hamelin’s widow, the Lady Sybilla seems central to the story. How genuine is her grief for her murdered husband, and what is her relationship with the boatman Ragnaill of Duiblinn? Bradecote and Catchpoll eventually confirm that espionage is at the centre of the story, but not before there are more deaths.

Any assiduous historical novelist can do the technical research on the customs, sounds, smells, clothing and political structure of the period in which they set their story. Weaving all these details into a convincing tapestry is something else all together. This is where Sarah Hawkswood (top left) is in a class of her own. For three hundred pages or so, I lived and breathed the Worcester of December 1145, and the present day became just a shadow. Like any murder mystery, A Shroud of Snow is riven with death, but it ends beautifully, just days of the most important Nativity of all, with a birth. It will be published by Allison and Busby on 20th August. For reviews of earlier novels in the series, click the author image.

August 18, 2026 0

THE HONORABLE MEMBER FOR MURDER . . . Between the covers

Maxwell Murray is personal assistant to Eliot Oakcroft MP, a handsome but utterly vacuous man with political ambitions that are routinely ignored each time there is a cabinet shake-up. The pinnacle of his career thus far is more of a gentle hillock – he is chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for miscarriages of justice, an appointment mainly designed to keep Oakcroft out of the prematurely grey hair of the Chief Whip.

The body of Charlie Cley is eventually found in a Norfolk cottage. Problem is, though, he did not die three years ago when he was first reported missing, but more like three hours earlier – and from a glass of red wine laced with poison. Rebecca Cley is released from her prison cell on the perfectly reasonable grounds that when her husband died, she was under lock and key in HMP Norton St Meals.

What sort of a hero is Max Murray? Can he carry the novel’s narrative on his back for 300 pages? The short answer is – no. He is too honest, too conciliatory and too hesitant. He needs the buccaneering instincts of Diana and Ronni to drag him from the calm waters of the harbour so that he can challenge the criminal Blackbeards and Captain Kidds out there on the open ocean. Is this Cosy Crime? If one applies the AI definition, “a sub genre of crime fiction without sex, or overt violence, typically featuring an amateur sleuth solving a puzzle or murder in a close-knit or picturesque community, emphasizing puzzle-solving, humour, and with a satisfying resolution where order is restored.’ then, yes, I suppose it is. The humour here is sharp enough, and there is just enough cynicism to lift the novel above the mire of elderly ladies cycling around Cotswold villages trying to discover who killed the local Master of Foxhounds. Such books were dismembered and cleverly eviscerated by the late, great Colin Watson in his excellent book Snobbery With Violence.

The crime(s) are solved eventually. more by the perscipacity of Diana than that of Max.I have a couple of minor quibbles; the last time I went to Fincham, the pubs were quite decent, and there was no sign of the breeze-block monstrosity featured here; as anyone who holds a firearms license will tell you, a rifle and a shotgun are two quite different things. That aside, I enjoyed the book, and found it an entertaining and witty read.

David Weir was born and brought up in Edinburgh where he played a lot of rugby and sang for the Pope in a national choir at Murrayfield and in Glasgow. He was a newspaper reporter for 11 years in Fife, Hampshire, Norwich and London interviewing among others Harry Secombe, Ralph Fiennes and a lot of politicians. Then, he went to work at the House of Commons advising MPs from all parties on constitutional stuff and arcane parliamentary procedures as well as running teams reporting on the Treasury, justice, prisons, courts, migration, policing, and Northern Ireland. This is his first novel, and it will be published by Allison & Busby on 20th August.

August 12, 2026 0

FIVE THINGS I SEE . . . Between the covers

Meet Detective Grace Hartwell, a homicide specialist in the police department of Jacksonville, Florida. Detective Hartwell is a loner, shuns social contact, and her life seems to rotate around the care of her cat, and her fierce fitness regime on the beachfront just below her house. She has two cases on the burner, both seemingly intractable. The more grisly is the murder of college lecturer Daniel Stewart and his wife Jessica. Jessica has not been sexually assaulted, but what is left of her face indicates the work of s deranged killer. The killer also abducted their young son, Shawn but, after an anonymous tip-off, he is found in the boot of an abandoned car, badly dehydrated, but otherwise unharmed.

Stewart was a serial philanderer, but who could he have upset enough to open up his femoral artery and stomp his wife to death? The death of Howie Scofield, a construction site inspector, was initially dismissed as suicide after his body was found next to a drained bottle of bourbon. It was assumed he had fallen from an unprotected balcony of the building he was expecting. But why was he there at the dead of night, and why has his house been ruthlessly turned over by burglars, and what were they searching for?

One of the Stewarts’ near neighbours is a man called Eddie Snow. Apparently a humble bartender, he has a security system of the intensity only used by federal cops and drug dealers. When Hartwell is warned off by her boss and told that under no account must Eddie Snow be investigated further, she smells a rather large rodent, both deceased and decomposing. When more female murder victims are found, with each bearing the grisly marks of what was inflicted on Jessica Stewart, the pressure intensifies on the Jacksonville cops.

If that weren’t enough, Grace becomes convinced that Howie Scofield was killed because he had uncovered a massive fraud being inflicted on the city finances by Glade, the construction firm involved. And Glade’s boss? Jackson Masters, a popular and powerful councilman who just happens to be one of Grace’s personal friends.

Each chapter begins with an italicized section of conversation. These conversations appear to be between a patient and and a therapist, but their relevance is not revealed until later in the novel. One rather obvious giveaway in this excellent novel is that, just over 70% in, according to my Kindle, Grace has her man. He has means, method and motive. Having a solution that far from the end of the book sends up a pretty obvious red flag that she has made a mistake. Or has she?

The solution to the mismatched DNA that crashes and burns Grace’s case is imaginative but plausible. The pyschotherapy conversations are eventually explained, but in a totally unexpected way. Wendy Church throws in a few well-loved tropes, such as the lazy. lack-lustre misogynist fellow officer, and the tight lipped senior cop ‘just following orders’.

Wendy Church’s novels are informed by extensive international travel and many careers. She’s been a bartender, tennis pro, management consultant, nonprofit CEO, PhD researcher, and dive bar cleaner. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her partner, and when not writing spends her time as personal valet to several furry housemates.

Like all the best female detectives, Grace Hartwell rides into The Valley of Death in the last few pages, and we fear the worst. In one way, and not a bad one, this novel is archetypal American CriFi, in that it is slick, tightly plotted, scattered with knowing product placement and cultural references. Fans of more leisurely British police procedurals may not find as much joy here as I did, but I shall now be on the lookout for Grace Hartwell’s next case. Five Things I See will be published by Severn House on 4th August.

August 3, 2026 0

BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS . . . Between the covers

“May you be in heaven half a full half hour before the devil knows you’re dead”
(Traditional Irish toast)

In this thriller, FBI partners Gus Wheeler and Vanessa Lambert travel to rural Maine to investigate the death of a teenage boy, whose shallow grave has been discovered by scavenging animals. His face is unrecognisable and, lying on his chest inside the rough pine coffin is a cross made of lead. He is eventually identified as Adam Carson. On arrival in Maine, the two agents, who might actually be on the young side to get the movie reference, realise that they are about to drive into what we older mortals might call ‘Deliverance Country’.

Fans of John Connolly’s superb Charlie Parker novels will be familiar with the forests of Maine, with its decaying cemeteries, isolated communities and memories of ancient evil. The author gives us little opportunity to draw breath. Adam Carson’s girlfriend has also gone missing, but neither her parents or their neighbours seem particularly bothered. Then, two more bodies are discovered. One is male, purely skeletal, and has been dead for some time. The second, a woman is equally unidentifiable, but for a different reason. Her corpse is charred beyond recognition, but the pathologist delivers a disturbing conclusion. She was standing while she burned.

If there was any lingering doubt in the minds of Wheeler and Lambert that they are – literally – in a dangerous place, their motel room is firebombed and they are lucky to escape with their lives. Stories of unspeakable deeds committed by religious zealots, using their faith as an excuse, are nothing new in crime fiction. An essential staple of such plots is the existence of a spiritually powerful central figure, revered but his or her congregation. The minister of the Slaves of the Secret Heart of Jesus is a forbidding character called Father Benedict, a former Jesuit now excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church.

Few thriller writers can resist the trope of a bad guy hiding within the ranks of the good men and true. The trope works best when it comes as a complete surprise, with readers being given few if any clues, and so it is here. Authors with musical axes to grind can be mildly irritating. The late Peter Robinson’s Inspector Banks had a very individual CD collection and, of course, Morse was a music lover. Mark Billingham’s Tom Thorne’s almost perpetual depression was usually accompanied by the lonesome tenor of Hank Williams. Gus Wheeler, however is a jazz man, and a string bass player. He even takes a rather dismal fold-up bass with him on his assignments. In my (probably limited) view, jazz died with Bix Beiderbecke, and so I couldn’t connect to Wheeler’s obsession, but that didn’t ruin a good novel, which has a captivating blend of menace, human frailty and the power of landscape.

R. John Dingle lives and writes from a restored 200 year-old house, on a small island in Mid-Coast Maine. The often-haunting themes of the rocky coast, as well as a lifetime of experiences in and around New England’s small towns, farms, and cities, provide excellent inspiration for the tones and moods reflected in Dingle’s mysteries and psychological thrillers. The two previous novels in this series are Karma Never Sleeps and Wings of Madness. Before The Devil Knows will be published by Tule Publishing on 29th July

The book will be available from Tule Publishing from 29th July.

July 28, 2026 0

CRIME IN THE GYM . . . Between the covers

The best fictional detective pairings are usually chalk and cheese, Yin and Yang, oil and vinegar – choose your own metaphor. DI Gilbert ‘Gil’ Markham and George Noakes fit the bill. Markham is subtle, erudite, good looking, and conflicted in love. Former Sergeant, now civilian consultant Noakes is blunt, uncouth, dressed like a nightmare – and is happily married. In their latest case, a celebrity Paralympic athlete is found battered to death in the weights room at the local Fitness For All gym. Jack Donahue, despite being confined to a wheelchair, was handsome, charismatic, and something of a poster boy. To some. To others, he was egocentric, vain, controlling and irretrievably damaged by a poisonous childhood. Donahue was doing a PhD at Bromgrove University and there is an extensive list of people who Donahue had upset, in one way or another.

Bedwell, Eloise – Secretary to the University Sociology dept.
Chase, Douglas – a right wing activist and post-graduate student
Crozier, Neil – gym manager
Cunningham, Deirdre – Donahue’s former personal trainer
Dade, Camilla – Donahue’s psychotherapist
Dawson, Vergie – Donahue’s alcoholic estranged mother
Dempser, Mr – former solicitor and gym member
Dixon, Poppy – ghostwriter of Donahue’s proposed autobiography
Eliot, Valerie – supermodel, and Donahue’s former girlfriend
Eyre, Dr Peter- Deputy Head of Sociology
Fairbairn, Isobel – ‘Silverfit’ gym member
Gage, Diana – disability rights campaigner
Gannon, Professor – Head of Sociology
Gillespie – piano accompanist for Silverfit dance classes
Goodwin, Richard – Donahue’s agent
Grosser, Michael – elderly gym member

I normally like to have a sense of place in crime novels, but I am not sure where we are here. The town is called Bromgrove but, even with a missing ‘s’ we are not in Worcestershire. There is a Medway Medical Centre, so perhaps we are in Kent, but the author gives us few clues. Markham’s love life is temporarily on hold. His long term relationship with his former lover Olivia, a vivacious but edgy woman, had ended, but they have established an uneasy platonic friendship. Meanwhile, he has distinctly unprofessional thoughts about his colleague Kate Burton, woman who is as cool and enigmatic as Olivia is emotional and impulsive.

When two older women connected with gym are also found murdered, the case becomes even more complex. I checked the sequence of Gil Markham novels, and it looks as if this is the 24th in the series since 2019, with some years producing four episodes. This may not be what it seems, as Joffe Books sometimes republishes novels under different titles. Despite the remarkable quantity of novels, here, at least, the writing is excellent throughout, with Catherine Moloney adopting a cool, almost sardonic tone and, wisely, underpinning Noakes’s near-clownish persona with hints that he is a serious copper and a decent family man. She has a wicked sense of humour as she describes Georges wife:

“Mrs Noakes, as ever when entertaining Markham, was dressed as if she expected to be photographed for Country Life, modelling a satin floral dress that made Olivia think of somebody’s missing curtains.”

Markham has a parallel case to contend with, that of a sexual predator who is targeting women at a local beauty spot known as Black Wood, but when a local journalist who has been helping the police is found dead, Markham feels surrounded by death, with no clue in sight, and no sign of a breakthrough. The sexual assaults and the murders are eventually solved, but I have a confession. In the end, I wasn’t that bothered who killed Jack Donahue. He seemed to be self-obsessed and abrasive. Not that those deficiencies should earmark someone for death, because someone, somewhere, loved him.

The reason for my lack of interest? The sheer quality of the writing describing Markham’s team and its inner dynamics made me laugh, made me think, and made me glad I was a fly on the wall. Forget who committed what, but revel in the superb characterisations that Mooney brings to the table. This is high quality writing – observant, witty, subtle and engaging. Crime In The Gym will be published by Joffe Books on 27th July.

July 24, 2026 0

THE QUIET KILL . . . Between the covers

London, early December, 1987. Detective Constable Jamie Day has been transferred from his relatively peaceful Suffolk home town to work with the Met, and his introduction to the decadent grimoire of the capital couldn’t be more horrific. He is first on the scene at Leyton railway station in east London, where the station master (with the help of urban foxes) has discovered body parts dumped in bin liners. It turns out to be the remains of Callum Michaels, a young man from Yorkshire who had recently arrived to begin work on a construction site.

It transpires that Callum was gay, and had effectively been kicked out of home by his rather puritanical father, after Callum and another lad had been rather indiscreet in a local park. Then, the frozen body parts of a middle aged homosexual, Johan Hendriks, is found in his chest freezer. The link between Callum and Johan is that they both had copies of the same ‘Tart Card’ (a business card advertising sexual services of all kinds, mostly to be found in public telephone boxes back in the day)

A third young man meets his maker, while police Top Brass are trying to keep a lid on things, due to Johan Henriks’ connection to people in High Places. In his innocence, Jamie Day is tricked into revealing details of the case to an unscrupulous journalist (is there any other kind?) and is suspended.

Robert Bryndza, like Jamie Day, is a native of Lowestoft. The Suffolk coastal town was once a thriving port but, even in 1987, it was beginning its downward spiral into being considered a significantly deprived town, with some areas ranked among the 10% most deprived in England, particularly regarding education, skills, and income. Like its near-neighbour, Yarmouth, it is a shadow of its former self.

It needs saying that this book is not a murder mystery, in the sense that there is any doubt over the identity of the killer is resolved fairly quickly. The tension comes from wondering just how the police are going to find him. It needs to be emphasised that the storyline is centred on the Gay scene in 1980s London and, in places, it is very graphic. Robert Bryndza spares us none of the gory details, but he always tells a good story, and you can read my thoughts on his earlier books by clicking this link. The Quiet Kill is published by Raven Street Books and is available now.

July 9, 2026 0

WHAT THE DYING SEE . . . Between the covers

Manchester. The present day. The central character is DI Thomas Ridpath, and member of the Major Incident Team (MIT), who doubles as Coroner’s Officer. He is a widower with a teenage daughter about to face her GCSEs. We learn right from the start that a serial killer is at large. He specialises in a warped version of Assisted Dying, and injects his elderly victims with fatal doses of pain relieving drugs. We know this. The police have no idea.

Central to the narrative is Margaret Challinor, the Coroner. She has returned to work after being debilitated by a savage random assault, which resulted in her being in a coma for many weeks. She has recovered. But has she? Thundering headaches suggest that all is not well, but she is a formidable woman, and battles on through the pain.

MJ Lee clearly has experience of being the subject of word-salad management speak. Here, a new commander (recently promoted from Traffic) gives the team an inspirational address:

“The Chief has asked me to bring managerial systems and competence to the organisation of the solution of crimes, to be data-driven in this age of AI, computers and complex analytics, an approach that builds on our core competences and resilience, but takes advantage of the sizeable opportunities afforded by this new technology and analytics to create a force that is forward-thinking, creative rather than reactive, one that uses its resources to the limits of their capabilities to serve the people of Manchester, ensuring they feel secure and protected as they go about their daily lives.”

Ridpath is resolute, persistent, and no-one”s fool. Those three qualities make him a thorn in the side of his pusillanimous senior managers who are bitterly resentful that a spreadsheet macro cannot bring to justice the person who is taking such obvious delight in ending the lives of Ill and vulnerable old people. Ridpath’s dogged attention to detail closes the case, but not before his own life is put on the line.

Apart from his scathing caricature of Ridpath’s boss and his oleagenous lanyard – class pomposity, MJ Lee doesn’t preach or wave any particular banner. The story – an excellent police procedural – did make me wonder about the overly politicised leadership of our police forces. I am not a Londoner, but the replacement of the ineffectual Cressida Dick with the operational paralysis induced by Mark Rowlands is a case in point. It you can hear my sigh of impotent despair, then it will be momentary. This particular rant is for another day. What The Dying See is published by Canelo and is out now.

July 7, 2026 0

A WASP IN THE BEEHIVE . . . Between the covers

The Brigid Reardon Mysteries by Mary Logue are historical mysteries centered on an Irish immigrant navigating the American West in the 1880s. Starting with The Streel (2020) and followed by The Big Sugar (2023), the series features a determined, independent protagonist who solves murders in places like Deadwood and Cheyenne while seeking a better life. This is the third in the series, and begins in Salt Lake City where the eighteen year-old Brigid is applying for a job in a bookstore owned by a Mr Cutter.

We know from a brief preface that this gentleman has five wives, but this is, after all, Mormon central. Mr Cutter is something of a nasty piece of work. Not content with his five wives, he has his eyes on a sixth, Amelia. Normal terms for relatives become a problem in pluralistic marriages, but I think Amelia is his step daughter, as she is the daughter (by a previous marriage) of his second wife, Sarah. Unfortunately for Cutter’s equilibrium, sixteen year-old Amelia has fallen in love with Brandon, Cutter’s son by his first wife, Eliza.

When Mr Cutter is found dead in the sewing room of their house – a room he never has reason to visit – Brigid is reacquainted with Dr Kohler, a man she met in the bookstore. Doctor K has little to do with live patients – he is the city coroner. Cutter’s demise ushers in a delightful (for us readers) whodunnit, as a longish list of suspects is instantly available. Was it one of the wives, driven by jealousy? Brandon – or even Amelia – angered by his refusal to countenance their affection for each other? Or is it someone outside the family with a grudge against Cutter due to some slight or grievance borne out of the complex local religious politics? Whoever, the relationship between Kohler and Brigid is a CriFi match made in heaven.

At 200 pages, this is more of a novella, but none the worse for that. Spoiler alert – we are introduced to the murder weapon early in the piece, but as to who wielded it, that is rather more nuanced. There is one trivial, but unfortunate, research error. Dr Kohler refers to the methods of Sherlock Holmes. This is 1881, and it would be another six years before the character would appear, in A Study In Scarlet.

Written in the first person, the narrative of A Wasp In The Beehive ensures that we know plenty about Brigid. She is a bright, resourceful and courageous heroine. Categories are subjective, I suppose, but they are useful for tags, so I class this as Cosy Crime. Not my chosen genre, for sure, but I enjoyed this tale. It is published by The University of Minnesota Press and is available now.