Crimespotting: An Edinburgh Crime Collection by One City Trust

Great little collection of crime stories based in Edinburgh written by a variety of writers, some such as Lin Anderson and Ian Rankin known for their crime fiction, others such as Margaret Atwood and James Robertson less so.  For me, the best definately saved til last with AL Kennedy's contribution although the quality of Rankin's piece was superb.

Dark Entries: A John Constantine Novel by Ian Rankin, art by Werther Dell'Endera

Magical jack of all trades Constantine and famous crime writer Rankin, creator of Inspector Rebus, is a mouthwatering combination and it doesn't disappoint. In Dark Entries Constantine is hired by the slick Matthew Keene when the new hottest reality TV show 'Haunted Mansion' begins to go wrong. The fame desperate kids in the Mansion are encountering hauntings the production team haven't created. So Constantine signs the waivers and goes in as a mole, but being Constantine he soon figures out the darker truth behind the hauntings, terrifying enough in themselves. Watch for when the borders of the frames turn from black to white. Rankin does a great job of keeping Constantine in character, Dell'Edera's black and white strips are stark and elegant and the whole is a brilliant indictment of the hunger for reality tv.

One City by Alexander McCall Smith, Ian Rankin & Irvine Welsh, introduction by JK Rowling

A great little slim volume containing short stories by each of the authors on the subject of social inclusion. McCall Smith's gentle romance is about an Indian man experiencing the culture shock of Edinburgh, Rankin weaves a clever story about a homeless illusionist, and Welsh comes through in his usual unrelenting style with a story about an escaped tiger, hilarious. Can't wait to read the next One City Trust book: Crimespotting

Exit Music by Ian Rankin

AZ:"It's late autumn in Edinburgh and late autumn in the career of Detective Inspector John Rebus. As he tries to tie up some loose ends before retirement, a murder case intrudes. A dissident Russian poet has been found dead in what looks like a mugging gone wrong. By apparent coincidence a high-level delegation of Russian businessmen is in town, keen to bring business to Scotland. The politicians and bankers who run Edinburgh are determined that the case should be closed quickly and clinically. But the further they dig, the more Rebus and his colleague DS Siobhan Clarke become convinced that they are dealing with something more than a random attack - especially after a particularly nasty second killing. Meantime, a brutal and premeditated assault on local gangster 'Big Ger' Cafferty sees Rebus in the frame. Has the Inspector taken a step too far in tying up those loose ends? Only a few days shy of the end to his long, inglorious career, will Rebus even make it that far?"

Rebus' last days before retirement dealing with 3 cases that may or may not be connected, a grisly murder of a Russian dissident poet linked timewise with the murder of Litvenenko, the murder by fire of a sound recordist and one time session player, and the attempted murder of Rebus' nemesis Cafferty. Read it in one sitting, absorbing in its fast pace and dreamy in the depths of Rankin's writing and memories of Fife.