Candles and Roses by Alex Walters
Are you ready for a trip to the Highlands? Because bodies have started appearing on the Black Isle and it sounds like a creepy place. The peninsula between the Moray, Beauly and Cromarty Firths, actually isn’t an island at all, but what’s going down there is plenty…
The Dead Don't Boogie
Written by Douglas Skelton — There must be something in the air up there in Bonny Scotland – it has more cracking crime writers than the calories in a deep-fried Mars Bar. This author even made the shortlist for the McIlvanney Prize for best Crime Book of the Year with Open…
The Turning Tide by Brooke Magnanti
You may remember Dr Brooke Magnanti as Belle de Jour from just over a decade ago, when she was writing shrewd, funny and searingly honest accounts of her life as a high-class call girl. Her identity was revealed with some fuss and scandal in 2009,…
Viral by Helen Fitzgerald
Versatile authors who write standalones often aren’t as highly revered in the crime fiction genre as series writers. This might be Helen Fitzgerald’s downfall. I admit I too like the stalwarts who consistently and reliably churn out stories about familiar and well-loved characters and settings….
A gazetteer of British crime: Scotland
A sense of place is one of those vital ingredients which can be crucial in a crime fiction novel. Maigret’s rainy Paris suburbs, Marlowe’s neon-lit LA, Harry Hole’s snowy Oslo streets – the locations are inseparable from the characters. Here in Britain we have our own…
The Ice Twins
The Moorcrofts appear to have the perfect life, until disaster strikes. One of their twins – blonde haired, blue eyed, inseparable and identical – dies in a terrible accident. Both parents feel their lives spiraling out of control due to alcohol and mental illness but for…