This week a review copy of a novel called Burial by Neil Cross plopped through my door (thank you Simon & Schuster). I’d never heard of him before, but he has apparently written a number of novels, a memoir, and is a TV screenwriter – he has been the lead writer on the BBC series Spooks for the last two series. The blurb on the back looked interesting, if full of references to secrets and rainy nights, and ending on an ellipsis (‘And maybe Bob doesn’t realise just how far Nathan will go to protect them…’), as is the way of many a crime novel, but just where on Kirsty’s Scale of Crime Lit would Burial fall? Would he be up there with Arthur Conan Doyle, or down there in the Pit of Embarrassment with Ms. Cornwell? I was nervous. My fingers (eyes?) had been burned by Child 44. Regular readers will know that the literary crime sensation of 2008 remains one of the worst books I’ve read in years, and Amazon said that if I liked Burial, I’d love Child 44.

But, phew! It’s infinitely better than that. It’s really rather good. In fact, I’d go as far to say that Burial is very good indeed. It’s the story of Nathan, who went to his boss’s Christmas party one year, only to end up having the worst night of his life. A chance encounter with a shady old acquaintance, rather too much of an illegal substance, and a young woman ends up dead. The secret is kept for years until Nathan’s shady old acquaintance, Bob, turns up unannounced to tell him that it might be out before too long. Nathan is desperate to protect the new life he’s built for himself, and before you know it there’s that ellipsis again…

What makes this novel very good is that Cross’s eye for characterisation, no doubt honed by his screenwriting experience, is absolutely excellent. More than just a straight, formulaic, romp through the aftermath of a crime, this is an adept psychological portrait of a man’s guilt and of his desperation to both make things right, and to protect who and what he loves. The narrative was pacy enough to keep me reading until near 2am on a weeknight, but not so fast that it felt rushed. It’s also rather creepy in places, and wonderfully atmospheric, thanks to mysterious Bob’s obsession with the supernatural. There’s one scene in particular where Bob tries to convince Nathan that he has managed to record the voices of the dead onto a reel-to-reel tape recorder (EVP, apparently), that made me shiver despite its brevity.

I could see Burial as a TV series. Not a film, I don’t think, but a nice BBC three-parter, an hour or so per episode, would suit it down to the ground. It suggests itself as such, no doubt, because of the author’s connections to the world of television, and because of the author’s skill with strong dialogue. However, Neil Cross is also an experienced novelist – his novel Always the Sun was long-listed for the Booker in 2004 -  so Burial reads wonderfully as a novel, rather than as a novelisation of something meant for the screen, if you know what I mean. This should appeal to crime fiction buffs, but I would also highly recommend it to anyone who just likes really good fiction. It won’t reveal the meaning of life, but it will keep you glued to your sofa for an evening.