MR TODD’S RECKONING

by Iain Maitland (Contraband £8.99, 288 pp) THIS is a splendidly creepy story about Malcolm Todd, a tax inspector who has been fired and is now trapped in a cramped, two-bedroom bungalow in Suffolk with his mentally challenged, and unemployed, adult son Adrian.

Malcolm is being driven to distraction by Adrian’s obsessive-compulsive behaviour — always chopping vegetables and rearranging things so that they look exactly right.

The story is told by Malcolm, partly as a narrative, but also as extracts from the diary he is keeping to maintain his sanity.

Gradually, it emerges that there is rather more to this ménage than meets the eye — where, for example, is wife and mother Dawn? Has something happened to her, or has she run off, no longer able to stand the claustrophobic atmosphere in a house that is also sweltering in a prolonged heatwave?

Stealthily, the truth seeps out — revealing that the bungalow contains a psychopath. But who is it?