Author Scott Hunter has chosen to set his series starring English former police detective Cameron Kyle in the 1970s, when the world was (or seemed) a little simpler. I have no objection to that. In the first book, The Fragile Cage, he seems to be paying homage to James Bond and the adventure stories of the period – and that’s fine too, as far as I’m concerned.

Cameron Kyle stopped being a cop when his partner was shot to death, and he himself took a bullet to the head, which left a sliver in his brain, in an inoperable spot. He now suffers from chronic headaches, and from personality change. Formerly a rather cautious man, he’s now a risk-taker – not exactly optimal for a guy who’s supposed to take it easy and avoid shocks.

Kyle has a former girlfriend who does social work with prisoners. When he learns that one of her subjects has kidnapped her and escaped prison, he goes looking for them. The police warn him off, but he doesn’t care.

The Fragile Cage is pretty well written, and it kept my interest throughout. I thought the plotting – especially the character development – was a little weak; the villains tended to be unnecessarily cruel for no apparent reason. The first big scene of the hero and a female cop in peril struck me as improbably complex, like a scene in a supervillain’s secret lair in a Bond movie. And the final confrontation between Kyle and the main villain was theatrical and unconvincing. So I don’t rate the book highly on believability.

But I did enjoy reading it. I might even read the sequel.