 Apart from the Anglo-Saxon cultural traditions with which he was brought up, Burdett has shown considerable familiarity with Confucian, Buddhist, Latin and North African societies, due to his extensive travels.The novels contain larger-than-life characters intertwined with a wry sense of humour and bizarre crimes.The crimes include execution by the release of a container full of cobra snakes into a car where the driver is forcibly prevented from escaping ("Bangkok 8"), the theft of valuable tattoos (and their associated human skin) off the backs' of murder victims ("Bangkok Tattoo"), and homicide related to the production of a snuff video ("Bangkok Haunts").