2020 supernatural mystery in modern Edinburgh, tenth in Oswald's
Inspector McLean series. A police administrative assistant doesn't
turn up for work, just as a major cross-jurisdictional investigation
is kicking off. Did she tip off the targets and vanish, or is
something more sinister going on?
There's a slight trend away from the blatantly supernatural here;
or perhaps McLean is coming to terms with it and not reacting quite as
strongly, or perhaps Oswald just wants to make sure this series
remains anchored in the real world. As usual there's nothing here
which is explicitly impossible in non-magical reality, but of course
beliefs in the supernatural form an important part of people's
mindsets and motivations.
There is some hint of progress after the treading-water of the
previous book; perhaps McLean is actually getting somewhere in his
relationship with his girlfriend, and at the very least we don't
have the pattern of the recurring figure of evil that's been in too
many of the recent books in this series. There's decent mundane
investigation, putting clues together in a sensible way, even if I
felt it took McLean perhaps a bit too long to reach certain
conclusions.
We also get the return of a character arrested and confined at the end
of Prayer for the Dead, book 5 of this series, who seems to know
altogether too much about what's going on (what with being locked up
in a secure psychiatric hospital and all). That character's
motivations are quite important, so I'd recommend that this book not
be read out of sequence.
It's unfortunate that elements of the criminality were similar to
those in a Stuart MacBride book I read a couple of years ago, so a
mundane explanation for parts of what was going on was very obvious.
It's more unfortunate that we get cuts away to the suffering of the
victim, which while they don't give away major plot points do leave
the reader rather ahead of the police in the first few chapters.
(Though at least, as a change from other authors who do this, they
aren't prurient.) On the other hand there's solid connection to local
folklore, picking at the details of the traditional story of Sawney
Bean to try to work out what sort of events might have led to the
invention of such a legend.
A series entry rather than a Major Development, I feel, but still
good.
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