Brighton Rock

"This is the book that made me want to be a crime writer. I grew up in Brighton in the 1950s and 60s and it was a thoroughly unpleasant place then — seedy and violent. It has changed dramatically in the last 25 years. The book has two really key things about it that were such a big influence on me. The first is that it has one of the most grabbing opening sentences ever written: “Hale knew, before he had been in Brighton three hours, that they meant to murder him.” You just have to read on after that. And secondly, I grew up weaned on Agatha Christie , Dorothy L Sayers and Sherlock Holmes and this was the first crime novel I came across where the central characters were the villains. They were the most important and interesting characters. You had someone like Pinkie, this teenage murderer, yet he is a devout Catholic who is obsessed with eternal damnation and sin and guilt. I just found the book absolutely extraordinary. I read it when I was 14 and said to myself: I want to write a crime novel one day that is 10% as good as this. I think it has stood the test of time because it is a real page-turner. It has got tremendous characters. There isn’t a dull person in the book. It is utterly riveting in evil and malevolence and in humanity. It is also universal. People around the world that don’t know Brighton read this book and still love it. Greene is an immensely compelling writer. He writes about big themes and he writes brilliant characters. Although the book is set in an English seaside resort it has got the themes of right and wrong, of guilt and religion and good versus evil."