Relight My Fire

(The Stranger Times 4)

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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

STOP PRESS! The Stranger Times wins the 2023 British Fantasy Award for Best Audio Work!

Some comebacks can be murder . . .

Stella is enjoying life as an almost student, or at least she is until a man falls from the sky right in front of her, leaving a big old hole in the pavement for Manchester Council to fill. The obvious question of how he ended up in the sky in the first place has no obvious answers, which is where The Stranger Times come in. This isn't just the hunt for another story though. Dark powers think Stella might have been involved and the only way she and the team can prove her innocence is to find out what the hell is really going on. What have dodgy gear, disturbed graves and a decommissioned rock star got to do with all this?

Vincent Banecroft has problems of his own in the form of a tall, dark but-definitely-not-handsome man dressed like a one-man funeral who has been sent to make the paper's editor atone for his sins. Once he finds out exactly what that entails, Banecroft is not keen. Being banished to a Hellscape for all eternity looks like being no fun at all, not least because he has that pale Irish skin that burns really easily . . .

All that plus territorial ghouls, homicidal felines, eternal (and seemingly unstoppable) gnomes and a celebrity 'Who's Who' that'd put a royal wedding to shame, and you're looking at a wild few days for The Stranger Times.

Relight My Fire is the fourth book in the acclaimed and brilliantly funny Stranger Times series.

©2024 C. K. McDonnell (P)2024 Penguin Audio

C. K. McDonnellBrendan McDonaldPenguin AudioThe Stranger Times

Crime Fiction

Fantasy

Fiction

Humorous

Comedy

Crime

Witty

Feel-Good

Mystery

Crime Fiction Fantasy Fiction Humorous Comedy Crime Witty Feel-Good Mystery

Critic reviews

McDonnell's world is transgressively hilarious, grimly banal and beguilingly warm. Of course there's a story that the intrepid journalists of The Stranger Times have to tease out: grave-robbing, cryogenics, a very angry witch, and a washed-up indie legend looking for a lost album, but the real joy lies in the pitfalls and pratfalls of getting there. (Jamie Buxton)

An absolute riot of a read.

Laugh-out-loud funny and full of colourful characters.

It’s no secret that here at SciFiTowers we’re massive fans of the Stranger Times series by C. K. McDonnell. Following the success of Love Will Tear Us Apart (which made February 2023’s list of best books), he’s back with book number four and we return to Manchester and the world of The Stranger Times newspaper who cover anything weird and wonderful.

I loved the dry and embedded humour of this book, it's the stuff of life . . . the whole thing is great fun.

You could be forgiven for wondering if author C.K. McDonnell could continue the high standards set in the previous three novels of The Stranger Times series, but fear not . . . Relight My Fire is perhaps the best since the original.

Wit, wonder and weirdness . . . McDonnell is an astute and enigmatic storyteller . . . eliciting visceral reactions from this reader who was at times stunned and falling off the chair laughing.

Most relevant

This series is fun, funny and with great characters!I have also enjoyed not just the name checking of places I know but the references, some subtle, you can only have from living here awhile. A rich, character led, well developed, well paced but, most importantly light hearted fun series.