What do you do when you discover a library book you haven’t got round to starting is due back tomorrow and that you can’t renew it because someone else has requested it? Read fast was my answer. I ploughed through Snakehead by Peter May at an intense pace and dropped it back this morning. I don’t think all books would be amenable to such treatment. Even some of May’s other work, like the Lewis trilogy, is a much richer style of writing which needs time to savour and digest. However, I’m inclined to think of his ‘China’ series (and ‘The Enzo Files’, another growing series from May) are more of the pot boiler variety; I’ll probably remember as much from sprinting through at a page every few seconds as I would have done if I’d started earlier and invested more time.