I stopped in at Whodunit, Winnipeg's mystery bookstore this morning looking for some Christmas gifts. While I was there I thought I would see if they had any used books by Ian Rankin that would fill the gaps for his early Rebus books. They had this one and one other so I came away very happy.

This is only the second book about Detective John Rebus but it was written a few years after the first book in the series, Knots & Crosses. Since Ian Rankin made a conscious decision to let Rebus age naturally I presume a few years have also elapsed between the action in the previous book and this one. At least, Rebus has been promoted to Inspector and his romance with Gill Templar is over so I think I am correct.

Rebus is called into a suspicious death in a squat that should really have belonged to DI Tony McCall but he was not available. A young man's body was found laid out on the main floor with his one hand clutching a package of what appeared to be heroin and a jar of syringes by the other hand. Two candles by his head had burned down to nothing. Nearby was a drawing of a five-pointed star inside two concentric circles. Perhaps this was some kind of ritual sacrifice. Or perhaps not. Rebus has to sort through all the false leads to come up with why this young man was killed. Meanwhile his supervisor wants Rebus to work on an anti-drug campaign that some of the top businesspeople in Edinburgh are financing. This leads Rebus into milieus that he has never frequented before. From a filthy squat to an expansive apartment in the best part of town, Rebus works his magic and solves the murder as well as making a considerable dent in the illegal underworld. Perhaps he is not quite the character we came to know and love in later books but it is great to fill in a few more gaps in his life.

I have offered this book in bookstogive's Mystery/Thriller VBB so I will reserve it for now.

Now off in the mail to booklady331 in Florida. This is released for the Allergic to A release challenge.

Received today. It may have been here sooner, but we returned from vacation today. thank you for sharing this book with me. Thank you for the note and letting me experiment with a new author.

Not sure what I think of Ian Rankin and Rebus- this is only book 2 for me. Enjoy the plots, the characters are okay, but need to be better deviolped. DThis will hopefully change as the same characters appear in books 3 and above. To me the enjoyment of a crime series is in following the characters developments & interactions with each other. Again, not happy with the choice of the bad guy.

Enjoy! Released on the Regal Princess in the library. Someone picked it up as it was gone when I checked the next day.