Cold Granite by
Stuart MacBride
pbk out January 06
(HarperCollins)
at £6.99
Aberdeen is in the grip of bitter winter weather: snow and ice on the roads,
sleet and driving rain, perishing temperatures. D S Logan McRae is back at
work after extended sick leave and is plunged straight into the thick of things.
The body of a four-year-old boy is found in a ditch. He has been strangled
and mutilated. And he isn't the only young child to go missing. This first
novel from MacBride is a gritty, gruesome, page-turner with lashings of
mordant wit. The Granite City with its inclement weather provides a suitably
dour backdrop to a story of dogged police work, tussles with a savage media
pack and the sheer bloody awful reality of dealing with the horrors of murder.
Not for the squeamish. Logan McRae, trying to retain some sanity, and keep
his job, in a world gone mad and bad, is a winner.
(
Cath Staincliffe
author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries and the series creator of TV Blue Murder)