Vienna Blood by Frank Tallis (AUDIO)

In 1902 a serial killer is stalking Vienna, pursued by Detective Inspector Oskar Reinhardt with the help of Freudian psychologist Dr Max Liebermann. On one level this is a great murder mystery and balancing of Reinhardt's old style detection and Libermann's radical theories, an early form of forensic profiling. Tallis has created an excellent story, with lots of clever twists that keep you guessing, secret societies, early fascism, nationalism and racial hatred.

What shone for me, however, was Tallis' evocation of turn of the century Vienna, a city poised between ancient traditions and the new world of Freud and Klimt. Liebermann's following of Freud and his treatment of a patient convinced he is having an affair with a member of the royal family bring to life the new wave of thinking breaking across Europe at the time. This is also brought to light by Tallis' backstory of Liebermann's sweet but shallow finacee, obsessed with social niceties, and Amelia Lydgate, a new kind of woman asserting her right to an education and equality with men. I particularly loved the descriptions of Vienna, especially their endless visits to tea houses for the kind of cakes Austria is still world first for today.

So a great read but enjoyably more than that, recommended