Buried Memories is the tenth Ishmael Jones mystery. In this case Jones and his partner/lover Penny Belcourt go to the site where our alien hero's spaceship crashed in 1963. The same machine that transformed him into an outward human wrecked Ishmael's memories. In book , , Ishmael learned that he wasn't the only survivor. The Organization, which is very secret agency Jones works for, is repaying a favor by investigating Norton Hedley, the isolated English country town next to the field where the ship crashed. (According to the introduction in Night Train to Murder, that field was in Wiltshire.) As the Colonel who gives Jones his orders says, somewhere has to be the strangest place in England. Is Norton Hedley that somewhere? In any case, Jones learns that an author named Vincent Smith might be the other survivor he's seeking. Will he find out the answers to questions he's had for almost 60 years?

All through this series I have suspected that Mr. Green is paying homage to the late William Hope Hodgson's Thomas Carnacki from his short story collection, Carnacki the Ghost Finder. This isn't much of a stretch on my part. I bought my first of his books, Ghost of a Chance, because it mentioned a Carnacki Institute on the back cover. In chapter one of Hex and the City, book four of Mr. Green's Nightside series, protagonist John Taylor claimed he used to work with Carnacki. Like Carnacki, Ishmael Jones is often called in to deal with something out of the ordinary -- and probably deadly. Sometimes I can guess which Carnacki story is being paid homage. Not this time.

NOTES:

Chapter 1:

a. Ishmael met and saved Penny in book one, The Dark Side of the Road.

b. Penny Belcourt's flat ('apartment' in American English), is described.

c. If you want to know the mysterious Colonel's name and backstory, see book four, Death Shall Come.

d. Jones helped Mr. Whisper of the Organization with the Harrow House matter in book nine, The House on Widows Hill.

e. 'The Case of the Missing Mummy' is what Penny is calling book four.

f. The 'Hole in Brassknocker Hill' case was in book six, Murder in the Dark.

g. Norton Hedley was built in the sixth century. The report on it causes Ishmael to dub it 'Weird Sh*t Central'. Many staples of horror and ghost stories have happened there.

h. Ishmael's interaction with Mr. Nemo occurred in book eight, Night Train to Murder.

Chapter 2:

a. Ishmael and Penny meet Lucy Parker, an annoyingly enthusiastic Black Heir agent, at Norton Hedley's train station. Lucy says she grew up a few towns over. She tells them that Vincent Smith died yesterday. Ishmael sends her to burgle Smith's cottage.

b. The Beeching cuts refers to Richard Beeching's 1963 report, 'The Reshaping of British Railways,' which recommended closing 2,363 stations.

c. Ishmael states he worked for Black Heir in the 1980s. According to chapter 3 of book three, Very Important Corpses, Ishmael joined the Beachcombers, who were replaced by Black Heir, in the 1970s.
Mentions: 'The Fortean Times,' Mr. Hyde, the 'Marie Celeste', Men in Black, and 'The X-Files'

Chapter 3:

a. Ishmael mentions the British Psychic Weapons Division and its obsession with security. He had to escort one of their Very Important Persons in book eight, Night Train to Murder.

b. Ishmael brings up an interesting alien weapon he found while he was working for Black Heir.

c. Ishmael explains why there is an underground market for alien tissue and DNA.
Mention: the Pied Piper

Chapter 4:

a. A hospital patient demonstrates just how addictive nicotine can be.

b. Penny tells Ishmael that he is speeding past paranoia and into the land of tinfoil hats and Trust Nobody.

c. The Pale Horse hotel is described and we meet its middle-aged owner and manager, Ellie Markham. Ellie says something about the [investigating agents] that contradicts something Lucy said.

d. As episode 85 of 'Mythbusters' showed, it would have to be a very small and crowded china shop for a bull to wreck much havoc.

e. Ellie talks about the late Vincent Smith, who came to the town in the 1960s. (In Norton Hedley, you're not a local if you weren't born there.) She suggests they talk to Smith's close friend, town librarian Frank Kendall.

Chapter 5:

a. The town library is in the shadow of a Restoration-period [1660-1666] mansion with very ugly sneering gargoyles.

b. Frank Kendall is described.

c. 'Groovy' is a slang word from the 1960s that meant something was cool, fashionable, exciting, excellent, etc.

d. Frank talks about Norton Hedley mysteries, including Murdstone Manse, which is sometimes sighted even though it was burned down by townspeople centuries ago. (Given that the Murdstone siblings in Charles Dickens David Copperfield were bad people, interesting...)

e. The wood around Norton Hedley has been filmed. It's just trees, but mysterious things have been seen there. Frank suggests they visit it.

f. 1968's Chariot of the Gods by Erich von Däniken is a prime example of the early kind of alien contact book Frank describes. 1966's An Interrupted Journey about Betty and Barney Hill, written in collaboration with John G. Fuller is the earliest alien abduction book, so far as I know.

g. The space ship crash happened on August 5, 1963, which Penny considers Ishmael's birthday.
Mentions: the 'I want to Believe' poster from 'The X-Files,' Dennis Wheatley Library of the Occult paperbacks, the original 'The Outer Limits', John Lennon glasses, ley lines, and alien encounters

Chapter 6:

a. The wood borders half of Norton Hedley. Something about it doesn't feel right to Ishmael.

b. 'Red in tooth and claw' is a phrase from Lord Alfred Tennyson's 1850 poem, 'In Memoriam A.H.H.,' canto 56, according to phrases.org.uk. Penny is not kidding about the older versions of fairy tales. I learned about some of them in my 'History of Children's Literature' class at library school. They are not for the squeamish.

c. Murdstone Manse, which disappeared from outside the library, shows up again.
Mentions: Agent Orange and the gingerbread cottage of 'Hansel and Gretel'

Chapter 7: We meet Detective Inspector Violet Silver, Norton Hedley's only cop. The first murder since 1928 has been discovered.

Chapter 8:

a. Ishmael and Penny discuss his past disappearances and what it must have meant to his friends.

b. Vincent Smith's cottage is visited. Ishmael finds a clue about Smith.
Mention: barely-animated old cartoons

Chapter 9:

a. We meet Muriel Lee, folklorist, whose daughter, Jackie, is one of Norton Hedley's many unexplained disappearances. Jackie was obsessed with finding that mysterious door to the Other World that is part of the town's folklore. She disappeared nine years and four months ago.

b. Ishmael and Penny have a second unexpected encounter in the town graveyard by its little church.
Mention: burning wicker men

Chapter 10:

a. The townspeople have surrounded the hotel. They're growling. There's been another murder. There's an interrogation.

b. Ishmael learns something about the transformation machine that made him look human.

c. Frank knew what Vincent was just as Vincent knew Frank was gay (the town suspects, but Frank is in the closet, so they don't care).
Mentions: CSI shows

Chapter 11: We learn about Violet and Vincent, the town's origin, what happened to Ishmael's ship, and the Organization's real job.

Chapter 12: It's back to the spooky woods and Murdstone Manse.

There's plenty of spooky atmosphere in Norton Hedley, not to mention its woods. Murdstone Manse seems a good place to avoid if one has no pressing need to go there. While one revelation didn't surprise me, another I didn't see coming at all. There are murders to be investigated as well as Ishmael's origin. If you like books in which villains suffer a suitable fate, this is definitely one for you. There's more than a hint that Ishmael can now get back home if he ever wants to, but he doesn't want to now.

As is usual for this series, it falls in one of the categories of Carnacki's cases: genuine hauntings or monsters, faked, or mostly fake with a touch of the supernatural. Have fun finding out which. ( )