Product Description

It is August in Edinburgh and the Festival is in full swing... A brutally tortured body is discovered in one of the city's ancient subterranean streets and marks on the corpse cause Rebus to suspect the involvement of sectarian activists. The prospect of a terrorist atrocity in a city heaving with tourists is almost unthinkable. When the victim turns out to be the son of a notorious gangster, Rebus realises he is sitting atop a volcano of mayhem - and it's just about to erupt.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #26911 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Synopsis
It is August in Edinburgh and the Festival is in full swing...A brutally tortured body is discovered in one of the city's ancient subterranean streets and marks on the corpse cause Rebus to suspect the involvement of sectarian activists. The prospect of a terrorist atrocity in a city heaving with tourists is almost unthinkable. When the victim turns out to be the son of a notorious gangster, Rebus realises he is sitting atop a volcano of mayhem - and it's just about to erupt.

About the Author
Born in the Kingdom of Fife in 1960, Ian Rankin graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1982, and then spent three years writing novels when he was supposed to be working towards a PhD in Scottish Literature. His first Rebus novel was published in 1987, and the Rebus books are now translated into twenty-two languages and are bestsellers on several continents. Ian Rankin has been elected a Hawthornden Fellow, and is also a past winner of the Chandler-Fulbright Award. He is the recipient of four Crime Writers' Association Dagger Awards including the prestigious Diamond Dagger in 2005. In 2004, Ian won America's celebrated Edgar Award for 'Resurrection Men'. He has also been shortlisted for the Edgar and Anthony Awards in the USA, and won Denmark's Palle Rosenkrantz Prize, the French Grand Prix du Roman Noir and the Deutscher Krimipreis. Ian Rankin is also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Abertay, St Andrews and Edinburgh. A contributor to BBC2's 'Newsnight Review', he also presented his own TV series, 'Ian Rankin's Evil Thoughts'. He recently received the OBE for services to literature, opting to receive the prize in his home city of Edinburgh, where he lives with his partner and two sons.

Customer Reviews

Classic how-to-write-crime novel.
This is my first Rankin novel. I've read his collections of short crime stories, and have found them excellent, so I decided to give this a go.

The first thing that strikes me about Rankin is his excellence as a stylist - the prose is sharp, clean, and everything means something. Too many crime novels just use lots of padding until the next plot movement. With Rankin, something is always going on, whether he's layering up his subplots, deepening characters etc. In essence, everything that a good short story writer does - just goes to show you that writing shorts is excellent practice for novel writing....

Rebus as a character is decent enough - Rankin manages to avoid the stereotypical flaws that pervade a lot of `bad' crime fiction. Rebus is just a normal kind of copper, a bit cynical, but not cartoonishly so. He has normal relationships with women, drinks a bit but not too much. His normalness is refreshing, although he's deep enough to still feel some attachment to. It's a nice balance that Rankin carries off well.

Anyway, plot wise, this novel develops nicely. Rebus starts investigating the death of a young man, and finds himself getting embroiled in various dark and dirty things that are bubbling away under the surface. A minor niggle with this plot is that, while not complicated in itself, there are a lot of bad guys in the mix, and sometimes it's difficult to separate them, given that some are on the same side and some belong somewhere else and some overlap, and it's not really clear until right at the end who plays what role, when it gets explained to us. I think I would have like to be a bit clearer about everyone's roles a bit earlier. By the same token, it's not really a whodunnit, given that it's fairly obvious which organization dunnit so that which particular individual pulled the trigger doesn't really matter.

So, style wise, Rankin is about as a good as any crime writer as there is. Plot wise, I think this particular effort was a bit jumbled, although it moved along nicely and did develop logically. I can't bring myself to award five stars on merit, but four stars seem harsh, so he gets a full house by default. Five it is.

Thrilling and Gripping With An Ending So Hidden I Collapsed!
A great book again from Rankin.

His mate and Colleague Holmes is attacked outside a bar one night after having an argument with his wife.

The tail starts with Holmes been in hospital and Rebus's typical nose getting pulled into something he shouldnt. Rebus also has his brother back with him and Rbus is back at his flat after a fall out with Patience.

This book was better than the last but had something a little lacking in the middle, but the ending was great, totally didnt see it coming, a great read as always!

A accurate portrayal
This is the 8th novel of Ian Rankin's featuring Insp Rebus I've read, and I was suitably impressed with his portrayal of the situation in Northern Ireland. Having been born in Londonderry and grown up in the Province, it was refreshing to read an accurate account of day-to-day life there, the RUC and the mindset of the locals. I take my hat off to Mr Rankin, its unusual for someone not from the North of Ireland, to reflect the "troubles" with accuracy and not "beef" them up to make it look like you can't get off the plane without being lined up in front of a firing squad! which I have found to be the case with someone who thinks thats what its like to live there or even when visiting there. He's obviously done his research well. Thank you.