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Cold Granite
592 pages
A bleak, rain-lashed Scottish procedural where biting gallows humor cuts through the escalating dread of a gruesome serial killer case.
What it feels like
This gritty Scottish procedural plunges readers into a bleak, rain-lashed atmosphere where the chill of the morgue seeps into every page. The pace is propulsive, driven by a desperate race against time as the stakes escalate and the dread thickens. Despite the heavy, dread-soaked mood surrounding gruesome crimes, the narrative is sharply observant, cutting the tension with a distinct, cynical gallows humor. The prose is powerful and unsparing, capturing the grim reality of a city caught between wealth and vice. It is a perfect fit for readers who devour dark, atmospheric police procedurals and appreciate a deeply flawed protagonist navigating both a harrowing investigation and the biting friction of departmental politics.
- Mood
- bleak
- dread-soaked
- chilly
- atmospheric
- Tone
- gritty
- darkly comic
- cynical
- observant
- Pace
- propulsive
- Themes
- urban decay · institutional friction · race against time · moral corruption
- The writing
- Unsparing and sharply observant, balancing gritty realism with a biting, characteristically Scottish gallows humor.
- The arc
- Begins in a state of weary exhaustion and plunges into escalating, desperate urgency as the grim reality of the case unfolds.
- Who it's for
- Readers who crave dark, fast-paced police procedurals steeped in bleak atmosphere and cynical workplace banter.
Content notes
- child death
- graphic violence
- serial murder
- mutilation
About the book
The debut thriller from a bright new Scottish talent set to rival Ian Rankin.It's DS Logan McRae's first day back on the job after a year off on the sick, and it couldn't get much worse. Four-year-old David Reid's body is discovered in a ditch, strangled, mutilated and a long time dead. There's a killer stalking the Granite City and the local media are baying for blood.If that wasn't enough, Logan also has to contend with a new boss, DI Insch, who doesn't suffer fools gladly and thinks everyone's a fool, and his own ex-girlfriend, the beautiful but chilly Isobel MacAlister, who also happens to be the chief pathologist. The only good news is WPC 'Ball Breaker' Watson, Logan's new guardian angel.The dead are piling up in the morgue almost as fast as the snow on the streets, and Logan knows time is running out. More children are going missing. More are going to die. If Logan isn't careful, he's going to end up joining them.Set in Aberdeen, where the rainy season lasts all year, criminal gangs vie for supremacy on the streets and the oil industry brings an influx of wealth and vice, this is a gritty, powerful and page-turning debut thriller by a writer with a wonderfully observant eye and a characteristically Scottish sense of gallows humour.
Description from Open Library.
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