Tag: Rebus

Book Beginnings & The Friday 56: A Heart Full of Headstones by Ian Rankin

Published on by Margaret13 Comments

Every Friday Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Gillion at Rose City Reader where you can share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading. You can also share from a book you want to highlight just because it caught your fancy.

One of the books I’m currently reading is Ian Rankin’s latest and 24th Rebus novel, A Heart Full of Headstones. I’ve read all the earlier books.

The first Rebus book I read was Set in Darkness, the 11th book in the series. It was obvious that this featured characters that had been in the earlier books but I didn’t find it difficult to follow who was who and their relationships. Even so I decided I needed to start at the beginning and read them in sequence. And I think, for me at least, that works best, in order to fully understand the background and how the characters interact and evolve.

My Book Beginning:

John Rebus had been in court plenty of times, but this was his first time in the dock.

Also every Friday there is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda’s Voice, where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an eBook), find one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.

Page 56:

Rebus had just finished eating an early dinner of microwaved haggis when he heard the doorbell. Brillo trotted with him to the door. Siobhan was standing on the step.

‘Well, well,’ Rebus said, while Brillo’s welcome was more effusive, ‘In you come then.’

Synopsis:

John Rebus had been in court plenty of times, but this was his first time in the dock…

John Rebus stands accused: on trial for a crime that could put him behind bars for the rest of his life. Although it’s not the first time the legendary detective has taken the law into his own hands, it might be the last.

What drove a good man to cross the line? Or have times changed, and the rules with them?

Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke faces Edinburgh’s most explosive case in years, as a corrupt cop goes missing after claiming to harbour secrets that could sink the city’s police force.

But in this investigation, it seems all roads lead to Rebus – and Clarke’s twin loyalties to the public and the police will be tested to their limit.

A reckoning is coming – and John Rebus may be hearing the call for last orders…

Oh, my goodness – the call for last orders? How will this book end? I just have to read it!

What do you think? Have you read it, or are you going to read it?

Rebus Returns! In My Friday Post

Published on by Margaret8 Comments

Book Beginnings Button

Every Friday Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Gillion at Rose City Reader where you can share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires.

In a House of Lies by Ian Rankin was published yesterday. It’s the 22nd book in Rankin’s Inspector Rebus series. 

In a House of Lies (Inspector Rebus #22)

It begins:

The car was found because Ginger was jealous of his friend Jimmy.

Description (Ian Rankin’s website)

IN A HOUSE OF LIES…

Everyone has something to hide
A missing private investigator is found, locked in a car hidden deep in the woods. Worse still – both for his family and the police – is that his body was in an area that had already been searched.

Everyone has secrets
Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke is part of a new inquiry, combing through the mistakes of the original case. There were always suspicions over how the investigation was handled and now – after a decade without answers – it’s time for the truth.

Nobody is innocent
Every officer involved must be questioned, and it seems everyone on the case has something to hide, and everything to lose. But there is one man who knows where the trail may lead – and that it could be the end of him: John Rebus.

~~~

Also every Friday there is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda’s Voice.

30879-friday2b56These are the rules:

  1. Grab a book, any book.
  2. Turn to page 56, or 56% on your eReader. If you have to improvise, that is okay.
  3. Find any sentence (or a few, just don’t spoil it) that grabs you.
  4. Post it.
  5. Add the URL to your post in the link on Freda’s most recent Friday 56 post.

I ‘m not up to 56% yet and my e-book doesn’t have page numbers, but by my reckoning page 56 is between 14-15% –  here DI Fox is talking about Rebus:

‘Rebus retired at the end of 2006. Well sort of.’

‘Sounds like you have come across him, though?’

‘John Rebus has a way of turning up. Anything in particular blot his copybook on the Bloom case?

‘He was mates with the boyfriend’s dad, a cop from Glasgow. Word was they kept meeting for a quiet drink.’ (14%)

~~~

I’ve been looking forward to reading this book as I’ve read all the previous 21 books. So, I had to start reading this as soon as it appeared on my Kindle yesterday even though I have plenty of books lined up to read next!

What about you? Does it tempt you or would you stop reading? 

 

Looking Forward to Reading …

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

Some of my favourite authors have new books coming out this year! Here they are in order of publication:

26 July 2018

Careless Love by Peter Robinson – the twenty fifth in his DCI Banks series.

Careless Love (Inspector Banks, #25)

 

‘With a deceptively unspectacular language, [Robinson] sets about the process of unsettling the reader.’ Independent

A young local student has apparently committed suicide. Her body is found in an abandoned car on a lonely country road. She didn’t own a car. Didn’t even drive. How did she get there? Where did she die? Who moved her, and why?

Meanwhile a man in his sixties is found dead in a gully up on the wild moorland. He is wearing an expensive suit and carrying no identification. Post-mortem findings indicate he died from injuries sustained during the fall. But what was he doing up there? And why are there no signs of a car in the vicinity?

As the inconsistencies multiply and the mysteries proliferate, Annie’s father’s new partner, Zelda, comes up with a shocking piece of information that alerts Banks and Annie to the return of an old enemy in a new guise. This is someone who will stop at nothing, not even murder, to get what he wants – and suddenly the stakes are raised and the hunt is on.

6 September 2018

Wild Fire (Shetland Island, #8)

Wild Fire by Ann Cleeves –  the eighth, and final book,  in her Shetland series featuring Detective Jimmy Perez.

Shetland: Welcoming. Wild. Remote.

Drawn in by the reputation of the islands, an English family move to the area, eager to give their autistic son a better life.

But when a young nanny’s body is found hanging in the barn of their home, rumours of her affair with the husband begin to spread like wild fire.

With suspicion raining down on the family, DI Jimmy Perez is called in to investigate, knowing that it will mean the return to the islands of his on-off lover and boss Willow Reeves, who will run the case.

Perez is facing the most disturbing investigation of his career. Is he ready for what is to come?

18 October 2018

Tombland (Matthew Shardlake, #7)

Tombland is the seventh novel in C. J. Sansom’s Shardlake series.

Spring, 1549.

Two years after the death of Henry VIII, England is sliding into chaos . . .

The nominal king, Edward VI, is eleven years old. His uncle Edward Seymour, Lord Hertford, rules as Protector. The extirpation of the old religion by radical Protestants is stirring discontent among the populace while the Protector’s prolonged war with Scotland is proving a disastrous failure and threatens to involve France. Worst of all, the economy is in collapse, inflation rages and rebellion is stirring among the peasantry.

Since the old King’s death, Matthew Shardlake has been working as a lawyer in the service of Henry’s younger daughter, the Lady Elizabeth. The gruesome murder of Edith Boleyn, the wife of John Boleyn – a distant Norfolk relation of Elizabeth’s mother – which could have political implications for Elizabeth, brings Shardlake and his assistant Nicholas Overton to the summer assizes at Norwich. There they are reunited with Shardlake’s former assistant Jack Barak. The three find layers of mystery and danger surrounding Edith’s death, as a second murder is committed.

And then East Anglia explodes, as peasant rebellion breaks out across the country. The yeoman Robert Kett leads a force of thousands in overthrowing the landlords and establishing a vast camp outside Norwich. Soon the rebels have taken over the city, England’s second largest.

Barak throws in his lot with the rebels; Nicholas, opposed to them, becomes a prisoner in Norwich Castle; while Shardlake has to decide where his ultimate loyalties lie, as government forces in London prepare to march north and destroy the rebels. Meanwhile he discovers that the murder of Edith Boleyn may have connections reaching into both the heart of the rebel camp and of the Norfolk gentry . . .

Also 18 October 2018

A new Detective John Rebus novel – In a House of Lies – the 22 in his Rebus series.

In a House of Lies by [Rankin, Ian]

IN A HOUSE OF LIES…

Everyone has something to hide
A missing private investigator is found, locked in a car hidden deep in the woods. Worse still – both for his family and the police – is that his body was in an area that had already been searched.

Everyone has secrets
Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke is part of a new inquiry, combing through the mistakes of the original case. There were always suspicions over how the investigation was handled and now – after a decade without answers – it’s time for the truth.

Nobody is innocent
Every officer involved must be questioned, and it seems everyone on the case has something to hide, and everything to lose. But there is one man who knows where the trail may lead – and that it could be the end of him: John Rebus.

~~~

I am really looking forward to reading all these books!

My Friday Post: Rather Be the Devil

Published on by Margaret5 Comments

Book Beginnings Button

Every Friday Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Gillion at Rose City Reader where you can share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires.

Ian Rankin’s latest book was published yesterday and it arrived in the post as I’d pre-ordered it back in March. It’s Rather Be the Devil, the 21st Rebus book.  I immediately started reading it.

Rather Be the Devil (Inspector Rebus, #21)

It begins:

Rebus placed his knife and Fork on the empty plate, then leaned back in his chair, studying the other diners in the restaurant.

‘Someone was murdered here, you know,’ he announced.

Blurb

Some cases never leave you.

For John Rebus, forty years may have passed, but the death of beautiful, promiscuous Maria Turquand still preys on his mind. Murdered in her hotel room on the night a famous rock star and his entourage were staying there, Maria’s killer has never been found.

Meanwhile, the dark heart of Edinburgh remains up for grabs. A young pretender, Darryl Christie, may have staked his claim, but a vicious attack leaves him weakened and vulnerable, and an inquiry into a major money laundering scheme threatens his position. Has old-time crime boss Big Ger Cafferty really given up the ghost, or is he biding his time until Edinburgh is once more ripe for the picking?

In a tale of twisted power, deep-rooted corruption and bitter rivalries, Rather Be the Devil showcases Rankin and Rebus at their unstoppable best.

Also every Friday there is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda’s Voice.

Friday 56

These are the rules:

  1. Grab a book, any book.
  2. Turn to page 56, or 56% on your eReader.
  3. Find any sentence (or a few, just don’t spoil it) that grabs you.
  4. Post it.
  5. Add the URL to your post in the link on Freda’s most recent Friday 56 post.

Page 56:

‘So what’s this all about?’ Chatham enquired.

‘It’s just a feeling I got, right back at the start of the original investigation. The feeling we were missing something, not seeing something.’

I see that even in retirement Rebus just can’t stop being a detective!

Even Dogs in the Wild by Ian Rankin

Published on by Margaret12 Comments

In Ian Rankin’s previous book Saints of the Shadow Bible Rebus was back on the police force, the rules on retirement age having changed. Now, two years later in Even Dogs In the Wild Rebus is on his second retirement – well almost. It seems they can’t do without him and when someone takes a potshot at retired gangster, Big Ger Cafferty DI Siobhan Clarke suggests they ask him to act in a ‘consultative capacity’ albeit not as a cop and with no warrant card or real powers and with no pay. Cafferty refuses to let the police in to talk to him – he’ll only speak to Rebus. That suits Rebus as he’s bored with being retired, each day the same as the one before.

It seems this is connected to the killing of David Menzies Lord Minton, a former Lord Advocate, who had been found beaten around the head and throttled. He had received a note: I’M GOING TO KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID – as had Cafferty.

A second strand of the story concerns the warfare between two gangs, one from Glasgow, headed by Joe Stark, who have arrived in Edinburgh looking for a guy called Hamish Wright and whatever it is he has stolen from them, and the other from Edinburgh, headed up by Darrell Christie, Cafferty’s successor. DI Malcolm Fox, no longer in Professional Standards, is seconded to the team of undercover cops from Glasgow, surveilling Stark and his men.

And so a complicated scenario unfolds, with more deaths, and so many twists and turns that my mind was in a whirl as I tried to sort out all the characters. After a dramatic scene set in woods in the Fife countryside some years earlier, the story gathered pace and tension as the various elements came together. Who is the murderer, what connection does Cafferty have with Lord Minton, how does the gang warfare fit into the murders, who is the mole in the Glasgow gang, and what happened years ago in Acorn House, an assessment centre for children in care,  a sort of remand home?

It was intriguing to see Rebus and Cafferty working together, although never fully confiding in each other. They have had a complex relationship in the past, aggressive and hostile and yet at times they have worked together before.  Rankin, as usual, successfully combines all the elements of the crime mystery with the personal lives of the main characters and at the same time highlighting various current political and social issues, such as the involvement of public figures in child abuse cases and the effect this has on the individuals concerned and their families.

The title comes from The Associates song of the same name, released in 1982:

Even dogs in the wild
Could do better than this
Even dogs in the wild
Will care for
Whatever means most to them

It’s also interesting to look back over the Rebus books which I began reading eight years ago (to the month!). They cover his life as a detective beginning with Knots and Crosses, first published in 1987. Rebus, ex-army, SAS was then a Detective  Sergeant, aged 42. He was divorced and smoked and drank too much.  By the time of Even Dogs in the Wild in some respects he hasn’t changed much – still a loner, still drinking and smoking, but so much has happened that he has changed, both in his personal and professional life. I’ve read all the books, but I’ve not written about all of them and some of my posts are quite short. At one time I began summarising the books, listing the characters and crimes, but I didn’t get very far – maybe I’ll finish it one day.

I like the series as a whole and think this latest book stands well with the best of them.  The first Rebus book I read was Set in Darkness, the 11th book in the series. It was obvious that this featured characters that had been in the earlier books but I didn’t find it difficult to follow who was who and their relationships. Even so I decided I needed to start at the beginning and read them in sequence. And I think, for me at least, that works best, in order to fully understand the background and how the characters interacted and evolved.

Has Rebus had his day? He tells Fox

‘It feels like the end of a long song though – men like Cafferty and Joe Stark … and me too, come to that … we’re on our last legs. Our way of thinking seems … I don’t know.’

‘Last century?’

‘Aye, maybe.’ (p 243)

We’ll see. One nice touch throughout the book is the little dog, Brillo who seems to have adopted Rebus – but will Rebus settle for walks in the country with Brillo, and being a granddad?

Saints of the Shadow Bible by Ian Rankin

Published on by Margaret2 Comments

I finished reading the latest Rebus book, Saints of the Shadow Bible a few days ago and have been wondering what to write about it that would do it justice. Ian Rankin is one of my favourite authors and his Rebus books never fail to impress me both with their ingenuity and the quality of their plots and characterisations – Saints of the Shadow Bible is no exception. In fact, I think it’s one of the best – a realistic and completely baffling mystery.

Rebus is now back on the force, the rules on retirement age having changed, but as a Detective Sergeant, not a DI and Siobhan Clarke is his boss. It begins with the discovery of a crashed car, on the face of it just a straight forward road traffic accident but it soon develops into a complex, multi-layered case, linking back to one of Rebus’s early cases on the force as a young Detective Constable. A case that with the changes in the double jeopardy law in Scotland can be reopened.

Rebus has always been an outsider, not one to play completely by the rules but his past gets put under scrutiny when Inspector Malcolm Fox investigates that case from the 1980s. There are suspicions that Rebus and his colleagues, who called themselves ‘The Saints of the Shadow Bible’ were involved in covering up a crime, allowing a murderer to go free.

The ‘Shadow Bible’ was a copy of Scots Criminal Law, a big black book

‘with a leather cover and brass screws. And we all spat on it and rubbed it in until it was dry. I thought it was a kind of oath, but it wasn’t – we were saying the rules could go to hell, because we knew we were better. We were the ones in the field …

The evidence was tainted, interviews hadn’t been conducted properly. How was Rebus involved, was he a Saint, and just how much did he know as a very junior member of the team?

The interaction between Rebus and Fox is one of the joys of this book as unlike Rebus, Fox does play by the rules. Ah, but does he? Beneath his controlled exterior Fox is just as much a loose cannon as Rebus, he’s not a team player either and it is fascinating to see how Rebus gets under his skin and reveals Fox’s true nature. For Rebus and Fox it’s the job that matters, but can they trust each other?

I wonder, though, just how much I would have enjoyed it if this was the first Rebus book I’d read. I have a feeling that I wouldn’t. There are characters who were in earlier books and references to previous cases which would have been lost on me otherwise. The first Rebus book I read was Set in Darkness (the 11th book) and whilst I had no difficulty in following who was who and their relationships I realised then that I had to read the books in order to fully understand the background and how the characters had evolved. I felt they were real people and I wanted to know more about them. I then went back to the beginning (Knots and Crosses) and read them in sequence, right up to the present day.

It’s all been an exhilarating and most enjoyable journey and I have a sneaking suspicion that this may indeed be the end – who knows? Only Ian Rankin and he isn’t telling, but he’s off on a year’s sabbatical in February and by then Rebus will almost be due a second retirement.

New Rebus book out in November

Published on by Margaret4 Comments

Ian Rankin has announced the title of his new Rebus novel – Saints of the Shadow Bible, with Rebus back on the force.

It had to happen …

Malcolm Fox is investigating an old case from 30 years ago – one that Rebus worked on in a team that called itself ‘The Saints’ and swore a bond on something called a ‘Shadow Bible’.

We’ll have to wait until 7 November to find out if Rebus was a ‘Saint or a Sinner’.

November’s Crime Fiction Pick of the Month

Published on 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.

  1. Murder by Yew by Suzanne Young (Kindle)
  2. The Whispers of Nemesis by Anne Zouroudi (from TBR books) (Kindle)
  3. The Warden by Anthony Trollope
  4. Standing in Another Man’s Grave by Ian Rankin
  5. Adventures of a One-Breasted Woman* by Susan Cummings (review copy)
  6. At Bertram’s Hotel by Agatha Christie
  7. 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.

Standing in Another Man’s Grave by Ian Rankin

Published on by Margaret12 Comments

Yesterday I received Ian Rankin’s new book, Standing in Another Man’s Grave and it’s looking good.

It begins:

He’d made sure he wasn’t standing too near the open grave.

Closed ranks of other mourners between him and it. The pall-bearers had been called forward by number rather than name – six of them starting with the deceased ‘s son. Rain wasn’t quite falling yet, but it had scheduled an appointment.

The deceased is a retired policeman. The unnamed man, standing at the funeral had known him. He was desperate for a cigarette. After the coffin is lowered into the grave one of the mourners approaches him with a nod of recognition:

‘John’, he said.

‘Tommy’, Rebus replied, with another nod.

Rebus is back!

With the rain now falling he heads for his car, turns on the car’s CD player and Jackie Leven’s voice emerges singing about standing in another man’s grave. Except he isn’t – the track is called ‘Another Man’s Rain’.

I paused and decided to look for the track. Here it is:

I’m trying to read this book slowly, but the plot and Rebus is gradually pulling me in. I just have to keep turning the pages. So, it’s back to the book now.

Fro more Book Beginnings on Friday see Gilion’s blog Rose City Reader.

Resurrection Men by Ian Rankin: Book Review

Published on by Margaret5 Comments

I’m on a roll now with Ian Rankin’s Rebus books. Resurrection Men is excellent, so good that I couldn’t wait to get back to it each time I had to stop reading. And when I finished it I immediately got out the next book in the series A Question of Blood, which promises to be just as good.

Resurrection Men isn’t about body-snatchers (as I wondered it might be), but about the cops who need re-training, including Rebus. They’re at Tullialian, the Scottish Police College and they are a tough bunch indeed, ‘the lowest of the low‘ as one of them, DI Gray tells a witness he is interrogating:

We’re here because we don’t care. We don’t care about you, we don’t care about them. We could kick your teeth down your throat, and when they come to tell us off, we’d be laughing and slapping our thighs. Time was, buggars like you could end up inside one of the support pillars for the Kingston Bridge. See what I’m saying? (page 326)

To help them become team players – fat chance of that I thought – they’ve been given on old, unsolved case to work on. But Rebus was involved in the case at the time and begins to get paranoid about why is on the course. It’s a tough, gritty story and as with other Rebus books, there’s more than one investigation on the go, several, in fact, needing concentration to keep tabs on each one. Siobhan Clarke is now a DS and with Rebus away she is in charge of the case of the murdered art dealer. Siobhan is getting more and more like Rebus and has a much bigger part in this book than in previous books.

Rankin is great on characterisation – they’re all credible, I feel I know the main characters. His dialogue rings true to life and I felt like a fly on the wall throughout, a bit uncomfortable at times as Rebus gets into tricky situations and tries to work out who he can trust. Both he and I were unsure right to the end.