Tangled Web UK Review December 2008
Doors Open by
Ian Rankin
hbk out September 08
Published by Orion
at £18.99
So here it is - the post-Rebus Rankin. I would normally give some résumé of the author’s career here, but that would be superfluous, wouldn’t it? Rankin? Has he written anything before? A few things. Yes, but has he picked up any awards? Just the odd honorary degree or three. Of course Rebus is referred to obliquely - the police station being a "damn sight quieter since you-know-who retired". Instead, we get a fast-paced caper novel (and I don’t mean that little pickled bud).
The tale starts with an image of scared people tied in chairs and threatened with murder. A few weeks earlier, it all seemed such fun. Mike Mackenzie is a self-made millionaire on the back of a dot.com sell-out. Now he is bored and doesn’t know what to do with his life. His only interest is purchasing works of art. At a sale organised by friend Laura Stanton, he meets up with his chums Allan Cruikshank, banker, and Robert Gissing, about to retire professor of art. They plot a heist to liberate some of those paintings owned by public museums and art galleries that are never allowed to see the light of day. Most of them are conveniently stored in one warehouse in Edinburgh, and even more conveniently public buildings there have an annual Doors Open Day. They plan to switch a small number of paintings selected by them as their favourites with copies made by one of Gissing’s students. Hugh Westwater - "Westie" - likes to produce copies of famous art but subvert them with a hidden twist, like a used condom in a 19th century landscape.
The three amateurs recruit a professional ganagster, who happens to be a school friend of Mike’s called Chib Calloway. The problem is that Calloway is in hock to a very nasty gang of Scandinavian Hell’s Angels who supply him with drugs. Their enforcer, Hate, is on the case. And to top it all, DI Ransome has a thing about Calloway and tails him at every opportunity he gets. The merry caper starts like an Ealing comedy and ends in a very dark way indeed.
The story originally appeared as a serial in the New York Times, and has been developed from that with a tip of the hat to Oceans Eleven. And Reservoir Dogs towards the end, which has a nice twist to boot. Readers will, like me, be curious about the works of art referred to. Rankin must have enjoyed himself laying all sorts of trails, and in-jokes. One of the early artists referred to is Bossun, who I thought was indeed an artist, but only as a Manga character. Utterson does exist, but not as the artist depicted in the story. Is this a nod at another well-known Scotsman? R L Stevenson’s narrator in Jekyll and Hyde is called Utterson. But the main artist, and Mike Mackenzie’s favourite, is Albert Monboddo. Is this drawn from the 18th century judge and philosopher? Or simply the Monboddo bar in Edinburgh? Have fun in hunting out more references for yourself. The story is slick and fast-paced, and free of Rebus, Rankin allows himself to have fun. But the ending is taut and full of scenes good enough to scare the pants off you.
(
Ian Morson
Author of Falconer books and short listed for 1999 Ellis Peters Historical Crime Dagger)
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