Crime Fiction Pick of the Month – Page 3

November’s Crime Fiction Pick of the Month

Published on December 4, 2012August 28, 2025 by Margaret5 Comments

I read seven books in November. Six were fiction, five of those being crime fiction and two were non-fiction* – two memoirs. I read two of the books on my new Kindle Fire.

Murder by Yew by Suzanne Young (Kindle)
The Whispers of Nemesis by Anne Zouroudi (from TBR books) (Kindle)
The Warden by Anthony Trollope
Standing in Another Man’s Grave by Ian Rankin
Adventures of a One-Breasted Woman* by Susan Cummings (review copy)
At Bertram’s Hotel by Agatha Christie
Full Tilt: Dunkirk to Delhi by Bicycle* by Dervla Murphy

My Crime Fiction Pick of the Month is Standing in Another Man’s Grave by Ian Rankin. I wrote about the opening of the book in this post.

Summary from Amazon:

It’s twenty-five years since John Rebus appeared on the scene, and five years since he retired. But 2012 sees his return in STANDING IN ANOTHER MAN’S GRAVE. Not only is Rebus as stubborn and anarchic as ever, but he finds himself in trouble with Rankin’s latest creation, Malcolm Fox of Edinburgh’s internal affairs unit. Added to which, Rebus may be about to derail the career of his ex-colleague Siobhan Clarke, while himself being permanently derailed by mob boss and old adversary Big Ger Cafferty. But all Rebus wants to do is discover the truth about a series of seemingly unconnected disappearances stretching back to the millennium. The problem being, no one else wants to go there – and that includes Rebus’s fellow officers. Not that any of that is going to stop Rebus. Not even when his own life and the careers of those around him are on the line.

My view:

I’ve read all of the other Rebus books and the Fox books and so was very keen to read this latest book from Ian Rankin. I liked it – I liked it a lot. It was like meeting up again with an old acquaintance. Rebus is older and fatter but he hasn’t really changed. He still likes working best on his own, taking risks, and having a few too many drinks and a smoke. He can’t keep away from police work and is currently working for SCRU – the Serious Crime Review Unit, a Cold Case unit of retired police officers (like the TV series New Tricks). Nina Hazlitt contacts SCRU (I like the acronym) about her daughter Sally who has been missing since 1999, convinced that it linked up with the disappearance of other young women, all in the vicinity of the A9. Rebus then links it with the current case of Annette McKie, aged 15, who has recently gone missing after getting off a bus at a petrol station in Pitlochry, also on the A9.

Rebus manages to assist in the current investigations, thanks to Siobhan Clark, who is now a Detective Inspector, although he is not a serving policeman. This involves him in travelling up and down the A9 and surrounding areas. The hardback copy of the book has coloured endpapers illustrating OS maps of the area, although if you want to follow the routes closely it’s best to use another map as well:

I was engrossed in the book and liked the way Rankin included characters from earlier books, such as Big Ger Caffety and in particular Malcolm Fox. Rebus does not like Fox, describing seeing him, ‘sliming his way around HQ‘ and he tells Siobhan not ‘to hang sound those scumbags.’ Fox, meanwhile, has got his eye on Rebus and the dislike is mutual, as he tells Siobhan:

John Rebus should be extinct, Clarke. Somehow the Ice Age came and went and left him still swimming while the rest of us evolved. (page 85)

I liked Fox in The Complaints and The Impossible Dead, but in this book he comes over as a changed character, vindictive and out to get Rebus. The contrast between the two characters is strong, with Fox twenty years younger, a stone and a half lighter, with a smarter appearance, looking as though he ‘could have been middle management in a plastic company of Inland Revenue.’ They meet in the police cafeteria where Fox has a banana and a glass of water, whereas Rebus has a bottle of Irn Bru and a caramel wafer, belching as he drinks, and looking a good deal scruffier. (page 73)

I don’t want to give away the plot, and will just say that I think the ending lets the rest of the book down. The identity of the killer came as a surprise to me and I thought that Rebus had maybe gone too far in acting on his own initiative, so risky! I had to re-read the book just to make sure I hadn’t missed something. Having said that, I was delighted with Standing in another Man’s Grave. I wondered, along with Rebus himself, how he would fit in with the changes:

‘The job’s changed, Siobhan. Everything’s … ‘ He struggled to find the words. ‘It’s like with Christine Esson. Ninety percent of what she does is beyond me. The way she thinks is beyond me. (page 188)

At the beginning of the book, Rebus is considering applying to rejoin the police force, as the retirement had recently been changed, so that those of his vintage are eligible. Whether he does, or not, is left open at the end. But I suspect that he will and that he and Fox will finally cross swords. I hope the next book will not be too long in coming.

See what others have chosen as the Pick of the Month for November.

August’s Books and Crime Fiction Pick of the Month

Published on September 4, 2012 by Margaret4 Comments

Most of my reading time in August was taken with reading Charles Dickens’s Our Mutual Friend, but I did read 7 other books too, all 7 of them crime fiction, although you could consider Our Mutual Friend as a type of crime fiction too. They are (in the order I finished reading them):

Lord Edgware Dies by Agatha Christie
Started Early, Took my Dog by Kate Atkinson
Postern of Fate by Agatha Christie
Guilty Consciences a collection of short stories edited by Martin Edwards
A Room Full of Bones by Elly Griffiths – post to follow
The Girl on the Stairs by Louise Welsh
Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
The Old Man in the Corner by Baroness Orczy

The links are to my posts on the books.

My Crime Fiction Pick of the Month is The Girl on the Stairs by Louise Welsh. Actually with the exception of Postern of Fate and The Old Man in the Corner it’s a close call between the other books.

The Girl on the Stairs is Louise Welsh’s latest book. It’s a tense psychological thriller about Jane, who is pregnant and living in Berlin, suspicious about her neighbours, as she hears screams from the next apartment, sees shadows on the stairs and feels she is being watched. Are her suspicions justified or is she paranoid? Read more …

Kerrie has a round-up post of bloggers’ book choices for the month, so for more recommendations, go to Mysteries in Paradise.

July’s Books and Crime Fiction Pick of the Month

Published on August 1, 2012 by Margaret6 Comments

In July I read 8 books, 6 of them crime fiction. They are (in the order I read them):

A is for Alibi by Sue Grafton
Bad Boy by Peter Robinson – review to follow in a later post
The Crimson Rooms by Katharine McMahon
Death at the President’s Lodging by Michael Innes
Dead Simple by Peter James
The Flight by M R Hall – review to follow in a later post

The other two books I read are:

A Mercy by Toni Morrison – review to follow in a later post
The Glass Guardian by Linda Gillard

And my Crime Fiction Pick of the Month is The Crimson Rooms by Katharine McMahon.

Kerrie has a round-up post of bloggers’ book choices for the month, so for more recommendations, go to Mysteries in Paradise.

Crime Fiction Pick of the Month – June 2012

Published on July 3, 2012July 1, 2024 by Margaret7 Comments

The Crime Fiction Pick of the Month meme is hosted at Mysteries in Paradise by Kerrie. I read 5 crime fiction books this month and my pick of the month is:

Red Bones by Ann Cleeves

Red Bones is the third book in Ann Cleeves’s Shetland Quartet. It’s set on Whalsay, where two young archaeologists, excavating a site on Mima Williams’s land, discover human bones. They are sent away for testing – are they an ancient find or are the bones more contemporary? Sandy Wilson, Inspector Jimmy Perez’s sergeant is Mima’s grandson. He is visiting his family when late one night he finds Mima’s body. It appears she was shot accidently by his cousin Ronald, out shooting rabbits. Then one of the archaeologists is also found dead, and even though it appears to be suicide Jimmy and Sandy are not convinced, thinking it could be murder.

I really like these Shetland mysteries. They are complicated and slow-moving books that enable you to immerse yourself in the mystery. The characters have depth and the locations are superbly described. In this book Ann Cleeves explores both the history of the island, its close-knit community, its traditions and the intricacies of the close family relationships. In contrast to the rest of the series the novel is narrated by Sandy as well as Jimmy and consequently both their innermost thoughts and feelings are revealed.

Red Bones is currently being filmed for a two-part TV drama. More good news – Ann Cleeves’s website reveals that there is another Jimmy Perez mystery in progress – Dead Water to be published in January 2013.

The four books in the Shetland series are:

Books I read in March 2012

Published on April 1, 2012 by Margaret3 Comments

I read some good books in March, four of them are crime fiction, indicated below by *, and one is a memoir (Testament of Youth). The others are all fiction. (The links are to my posts on the books).

My Book of the Month has to be Pride and Prejudice and my Crime Fiction Book of the Month is a close call between the books rated 4/5, but on balance I think Peter Robinson’s Before the Poison comes out on top.

So far this month I’ve read 24 books, 22 of them fiction (12 of which are crime fiction), and 2 non-fiction. I’ve been making inroads into my TBR books, with 10 of the 24 books being books I’ve owned since before January 2012.