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XLVIII: The Saxon Shore Way (2006)
A cheat really - basically a publicity puff for the long distance footpath giving you little more than a description of the general route and then focusing on eight circular routes of varying lengths at various points on the path. You'd walk about 10% of the route if you did this, maybe less. There are reproductions of OS maps for the selected journeys, which aren't always clear (there's a lot of retracing steps) and brief descriptions of some of the elements on show, and a blank page for each walk for your notes. Chiz.
IL: Ian Rankin, Dead Souls (1999)
It's a Gogol reference, innit? And Joy Division, rather than Rolling Stones.
Rebus is meant to be tracking a poisoner in Edinburgh Zoo when he sees a newly released paedophile whose address he then leaks to the press. Meanwhile another cop dies on Salisbury Crags - possibly an accident, possibly suicide, but Rebus suspects murder - and a British multiple murderer has been deported to the UK from the US and is now in Edinburgh. As if this weren't enough plates to keep spinning, the son of an old flame has gone missing, and Rebus has to look for him.
This was a satisfying, gripping read, in which the multiple threads are cleverly interwoven. The thing I need to come to terms with in detective fiction is the tendency for three isolated crimes (stealing of milk bottles, the murder of a plumber, vandalism in the grave yard) magically being resolved into one case, as the detective joins the dots. From a real-life perspective (note I don't say realistic) this always seems unconvincing - but equally if the detective just looked at three crimes you might feel disappointed as a reader. Here there is a sense of cause and effect: the arena is Edinburgh and, yes, there are a finite number of people in Edinburgh, so they are going to bump into each other. One plot line collides with another rather than becoming one.
Of course there's extra resonance as I recognise a number of the places - see, say, http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3130/2800909461_fc2a9bbbf9_b.jpg - but this is set before the building of the Scottish Parliament. As always Rebus's girlfriend seems to exist off stage - down the phone, on the answerphone, in the next room, and even the novel notes she's living up to the name Patience.
I picked this up in Rainham; now I need to seek out the next - Set in Darkness, although I should be reading for research.
A cheat really - basically a publicity puff for the long distance footpath giving you little more than a description of the general route and then focusing on eight circular routes of varying lengths at various points on the path. You'd walk about 10% of the route if you did this, maybe less. There are reproductions of OS maps for the selected journeys, which aren't always clear (there's a lot of retracing steps) and brief descriptions of some of the elements on show, and a blank page for each walk for your notes. Chiz.
IL: Ian Rankin, Dead Souls (1999)
It's a Gogol reference, innit? And Joy Division, rather than Rolling Stones.
Rebus is meant to be tracking a poisoner in Edinburgh Zoo when he sees a newly released paedophile whose address he then leaks to the press. Meanwhile another cop dies on Salisbury Crags - possibly an accident, possibly suicide, but Rebus suspects murder - and a British multiple murderer has been deported to the UK from the US and is now in Edinburgh. As if this weren't enough plates to keep spinning, the son of an old flame has gone missing, and Rebus has to look for him.
This was a satisfying, gripping read, in which the multiple threads are cleverly interwoven. The thing I need to come to terms with in detective fiction is the tendency for three isolated crimes (stealing of milk bottles, the murder of a plumber, vandalism in the grave yard) magically being resolved into one case, as the detective joins the dots. From a real-life perspective (note I don't say realistic) this always seems unconvincing - but equally if the detective just looked at three crimes you might feel disappointed as a reader. Here there is a sense of cause and effect: the arena is Edinburgh and, yes, there are a finite number of people in Edinburgh, so they are going to bump into each other. One plot line collides with another rather than becoming one.
Of course there's extra resonance as I recognise a number of the places - see, say, http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3130/2800909461_fc2a9bbbf9_b.jpg - but this is set before the building of the Scottish Parliament. As always Rebus's girlfriend seems to exist off stage - down the phone, on the answerphone, in the next room, and even the novel notes she's living up to the name Patience.
I picked this up in Rainham; now I need to seek out the next - Set in Darkness, although I should be reading for research.
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