Relight My Fire

(The Stranger Times 4)

By: C. K. McDonnell

Narrated by: Brendan McDonald

Brought to you by Penguin.

STOP PRESS! The Stranger Times wins the 2023 British Fantasy Award for Best Audio Work!

Some comebacks can be murder . . .

Stella is enjoying life as an almost student, or at least she is until a man falls from the sky right in front of her, leaving a big old hole in the pavement for Manchester Council to fill. The obvious question of how he ended up in the sky in the first place has no obvious answers, which is where The Stranger Times come in. This isn't just the hunt for another story though. Dark powers think Stella might have been involved and the only way she and the team can prove her innocence is to find out what the hell is really going on. What have dodgy gear, disturbed graves and a decommissioned rock star got to do with all this?

Vincent Banecroft has problems of his own in the form of a tall, dark but-definitely-not-handsome man dressed like a one-man funeral who has been sent to make the paper's editor atone for his sins. Once he finds out exactly what that entails, Banecroft is not keen. Being banished to a Hellscape for all eternity looks like being no fun at all, not least because he has that pale Irish skin that burns really easily . . .

All that plus territorial ghouls, homicidal felines, eternal (and seemingly unstoppable) gnomes and a celebrity 'Who's Who' that'd put a royal wedding to shame, and you're looking at a wild few days for The Stranger Times.

Relight My Fire is the fourth book in the acclaimed and brilliantly funny Stranger Times series.

©2024 C. K. McDonnell (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

McDonnell's world is transgressively hilarious, grimly banal and beguilingly warm. Of course there's a story that the intrepid journalists of The Stranger Times have to tease out: grave-robbing, cryogenics, a very angry witch, and a washed-up indie legend looking for a lost album, but the real joy lies in the pitfalls and pratfalls of getting there. (Jamie Buxton)

An absolute riot of a read.

Laugh-out-loud funny and full of colourful characters.

It’s no secret that here at SciFiTowers we’re massive fans of the Stranger Times series by C. K. McDonnell. Following the success of Love Will Tear Us Apart (which made February 2023’s list of best books), he’s back with book number four and we return to Manchester and the world of The Stranger Times newspaper who cover anything weird and wonderful.

I loved the dry and embedded humour of this book, it's the stuff of life . . . the whole thing is great fun.

You could be forgiven for wondering if author C.K. McDonnell could continue the high standards set in the previous three novels of The Stranger Times series, but fear not . . . Relight My Fire is perhaps the best since the original.

Wit, wonder and weirdness . . . McDonnell is an astute and enigmatic storyteller . . . eliciting visceral reactions from this reader who was at times stunned and falling off the chair laughing.

Hilariously Fun

Easily one of my favorite series, I just wish I could steal someone’s life force so I could jump to the next book.

Another tour de force from MacDonnell

Unsurprisingly, my favorite living author has charmed me once again. I absolutely love this series, and Relight My Fire continues and advances the lives and adventures of some of my favorite people.

if you like clever, unforced humor, three-dimensional characters, and a fantastical plotline (in both senses), get it. it won't disappoint. I cannot recommend McDonnell highly enough. Brendan McDonald's performance as reader really brings the book to life in a way that I find unparalleled. I feel that if I were to visit Manchester I'd likely meet these characters in the street, and that makes me happy. I just wish they could crank out a book a week...

what a story!

as always, a brilliant story with delightful characters, read by the same excellent narrator. I mourn each time one of these Stranger Times books ends!

Great, shouty fun

I love how these characters have developed, and McDonnell’s ability to render a group of people who seem to barely tolerate eachother, yet would do almost anything to protect eachother. A lot of funny, laugh out loud moments, and some truly ghoulish stuff all manage to be turned on their head with McDonnell’s inventiveness.
The performance was top notch, though it was far more shouty than I was prepared for so be aware this book, like its subject matter, is hilariously LOUD.

Always love these! Great narrator and writer

These are so fun a great story, great narration, really funny, nice break from murder mysteries, and sci-fi