Reviews of Kiss her goodbye

"Guthrie writes with an urgency, energy, cynical realism and mastery of casual violence that is rarely encountered in British crime writing"
Marcel Berlins, The Times
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"delectably nasty"
Ruth Gutman, New York Post

"... prose and scenes are lean and sharp, built for speed, built for excitement, with characters who immediately make an impact as forceful as a baseball bat through a car windscreen."
Calum Macleod, Shots Magazine
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"This tough, uncompromising crime thriller grabs the reader's attention from the first page and does not let hold of its grip until the final...Recommended for fans of quality hardboiled fiction"
Canberra Sunday Times

"Hard-hitting story with plenty of excitement"
The Bournemouth Echo

"...a master storyteller"
FishComCollective

"This book impressed me in a whole lot of ways..."
Ron Fortier, Paperback Bazaar

"...a good solid slice of
gritty urban noir"
Bullet Magazine

"...a good book, well worth the read."
Megan Powell

"This intense, well-written mystery -- featuring a wide and deep cast of characters and a complex situation -- is a worthy offering in the noir field and well worth your time."
Kevin Tipple, The Readers Room
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"Guthrie is a fiend with his pen ... [Kiss Her Goodbye has] enough violence and pathos to satisfy even the most jaded crime reader, and it offers solid insight into the realization that everybody is crazy, no matter where you live."
Craig's Book Club
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"Kiss Her Goodbye moves fast, and there are plenty of interesting characters to meet along the way. My favorite is Tina, a prostitute who can handle a baseball bat almost as well as Joe. (Check out that great cover.) The climax is as nerve-wracking as anybody could ask for."
Bill Crider
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"Guthrie builds characters a bit more complex than the familiar Brit-noir toughs"
Kerry J. Schooley
Murder Out There
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"A virtual classic that takes the genre to its pared-back, squealing limit. The writing is tight, the story as poised and precisely plotted as the finest of Ed McBain's procedural gems. Guthrie's control of this dark material is sheer wizardry. Every detail earns its keep, every slyly placed punctuation mark is a perfectly weighted tic in the slipstreamed unfurling"
Tom Adair, The Scotsman

"a gripping tale of betrayal and deception"
Marie Jenkinson, Waterstone's Books Quarterly

"...this dark and violent tapestry will absorb you"
Sydney Morning Herald

"Guthrie adroitly shifts suspicions and bends allegiances over the course of his assured second novel. In a manner that recalls the best of James Ellroy's L.A. Quartet, unexpected alliances are forged ... characterizations are deftly revised and the terrain remains engagingly uncertain ... Guthrie's is a stellar sophomore turn and Kiss Her Goodbye is the noir equivalent of a double dram of Talisker: silky liquid lava to die for."
Craig McDonald, This Week Newspapers
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"...a masterpiece of noir"
Benjamin Boulden
Adventure Fiction Magazine"

"A classic underworld story that moves along fast"
Hobart Mercury

"...lives up to Hard Case's reputation for gritty noir thrillers that pull no punches."
Publishers Weekly

"Scottish writer Allan Guthrie’s second novel, set in Edinburgh, is a page-turning countdown to Joe’s violent explosion in his hunt for the person he believes is behind Gemma’s death."
Giant Magazine

"Guthrie has a nice clipped way with scenes that in this age of bloat usually go on far too long. He gives you the moment, like a snapshot, and goes on to the next moment. Don't confuse this with underplaying. It's playing just right."
Ed Gorman

"Kiss Her Goodbye is very well done, the Scottish scene vividly depicted and the characters memorably three-dimensional. Allan Guthrie has a bright -- or should I say dark? -- future in crime fiction. I look forward to reading more by him."
Bill Pronzini

"Kiss Her Goodbye is one hell of a page-turner. I couldn't have turned those pages any faster if Guthrie had put a gun to my head and said, "Turn those fucking pages faster, you bastard.""
Charlie Williams

"I have seldom read a faster-paced novel and the energy in Guthrie's prose drags the reader along by the hair into an Edinburgh peppered with petty thugs, gangsters, whores and hapless cops that is never less than compelling."
Doug Shepherd, The Herald

"...a surprisingly sophisticated and well crafted tale that subtly weaves in subplots and observations of his characters that keep the suspense going until the final chapters."
Brian Lindemuth, MysteryBookSpot
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"a minor noir classic"
Gary Lovisi, Crime Time

"...a truly magnificent and expertly written masterpiece"
Dr Amanda Gillies, Lothian Life

"The simplicity of the novel's family-centred plot gives ample room for the development of characters - and they are very vivid, the whole of the central cast, tough and funny, as in the first novel, but also moving and vulnerable in ways that make the reader anxious for their safety."
Lee Horsley, Crime Culture
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"Guthrie has this stuff nailed."
Charlie Stella, Knucksline

"Kiss Her Goodbye is tough-as-nails Scots noir. Deftly characterised, with witty dialogue and a mean plot, Guthrie’s excellent second novel is lean, keen and pure hardboiled heaven. Its rare that a British writer comes along who just pulls you into his world so easily. But Guthrie leads you willingly with a tough, no-nonsense style and the kind of easy-going storytelling ability missing from so many new writers trying their damndest to break the marketplace today."
Russel D McLean, Crime Scene Scotland
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"Kiss Her Goodbye is a slice of Scottish granite, hard and bitter as the dialect of an Edinburgh public bar, dark as the news that Joe Hope receives on the very first page. Allan Guthrie's style is the spectre of Jim Thompson, drenched in Highland rain, soaked in whiskey that burns across the page. Like the master, there is a wicked gallows humour that has you laughing nervously as your teeth hurt from clenching them. Raw, vivid and so in your face you can smell the beer. Cooper, Joe's employer, is the most fascinating thug to wield a bat since Lou Ford stepped up to the plate. In 'panic flicker', he gives us a whole new concept. The ending is a kick in the gut that is as shocking as it is haunting. A novel with moments of compassion to shrieve the cold heart and a cast of characters—Tina, Monkman, Park—who scream off the page. Joe asks, the narrative asks, almost mockingly: can you be still? Not with this keg of gelignite in your hands. Awesome."
Ken Bruen