Along the River Run
Lisbon: that city at the mouth of the Tagus, that city that whispers, licks and seduces its visitors, that city that haunts those seeking refuge or its pleasures. Who would wish to escape?
It is the start of the millennium and two ‘lads’ from South East London are trapped in Lisbon among people and experiences set to push them to the limits. Attempting to lie low after a fateful night back home, the friends find themselves navigating an unnerving new reality in this haunting story of psychological destruction.
A crime novel inspired by a real-life incident, and distinguished by its sensitivity to the subtleties of language and dialogue, Along the River Run is a story of guilt and retribution played out amid the streets, sounds and sights of this bewitching city.
Just as the undercurrents of Lisbon’s Tagus are ever present, so the literary undercurrents of the capital as written by Pessoa or Sa-Carneiro are there to enrich and pervade the evolving narrative.
‘A smartly crafted and necessary antidote to this fearful Little England moment. Paul Buck’s fast-moving Série Noire existentialism exposes a pair of lost or posthumous Estuary souls to the treacherous seductions of the Lisbon labyrinth. You can trust the teller and the tale.’ – Iain Sinclair
‘Along the River Run stages the rape-revenge whodunnit as a failed and ghostridden getaway attempt. Ever a translator, in this case, from Kent via Lisbon and outward, Buck transliterates from the racist-xenophobic tabloid-misogynistic masculine of the early twenty-first century. His craft, here a deep and dangerously tender proceduralism, is propelled by the powerful currents of a lifelong engagement with the feminine.’ – Hestia Peppe
‘English lads on the lam in Lisbon, their skins too thin, beered-up and on edge, unmoored by ghosts and bloody memories: Along the River Run is hypnagogic noir, a red-light unravelling, a fever-dream of a Mediterranean thriller.’ – Sukhdev Sandhu