Dead Souls: From the iconic #1 bestselling author of A SONG FOR THE DARK TIMES (Inspector Rebus Book 10)

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In addition, a convicted murderer who spent 25 years in an American prison has been released and deported to Edinburgh, where he grows up. He is seeking to settle old scores but not until he spends some time with a local reporter talking about his life for a series of articles. Detective Inspector Abernethy is a representative of the Special Branch (Metropolitan Police). He involves himself in two of Rebus's cases. In Mortal Causes (1994) he is interested in the relationships between Irish and Scottish paramilitary groups, and gun-running. In The Hanging Garden (1998) he tells Rebus that it is not in the national interest for Rebus to succeed in his efforts to persuade Mr. Lintz to talk about his activities as a Nazi. Maybe that's just because, eight books in, I'm used to a certain rhythm to a Rebus story, one which can't really be achieved with this word count. A Rebus book is always playful with how it tells the story - there's always a number of different plot lines - often conflicting, calling out for our protagonist's attention and pushing him into impossible corners. And Rankin teases out these plot lines giving you a little at a time, never giving you the full picture until he has to. These sub plots work in solidarity to enhance the overall story, and their absence was the most striking thing to me about 'Death is Not the End' - leaving it feeling a little simplistic and ultimately unfulfilling. This is one of the darker Rebus tales (not that any of them are especially light!) involving, as it does, pedophiles (who may or may not be linked to the Church), the suicide of a colleague, a psychopathic serial killer, and a bittersweet trip down memory lane as he is drawn into the search for a missing person, son of two of his classmates in school. Scotland is a small country and Edinburgh still has something of a village culture. You just know that somewhere along the way all these disparate stories are going to intersect and the result will probably not be pretty. But it will be entertaining. Clarke is much younger than Rebus. Her parents are English and politically active on the left. She has a college degree. She is a devoted follower of the Hibernian Football Club ("Hibs"). As a woman, she faces obstacles to acceptance in the police force, especially since, like Rebus, she enjoys the challenges of solving cases rather than administrative work or networking.

Rebus finds himself being investigated by an old friend after a murderer walks free on a technicality. Matters are made worse when the suspect and his brother are found dead, and the prosecutor in the case is found to have been paid off to discredit Rebus and his colleagues. It feels a little overdue for Rebus to suddenly stumble across the realization that – hey! – maybe people's lousy childhoods have an irrevocable effect on their adult lives. But when the results are this good, better late, as they say, than never. Arthur's Seat crouches behind him, humped and silent as though offended by his presence, coiled to pounce. He tells himself it is papier-mâché. He smooths his hands over strips of newsprint, not reading the stories, then realises he is stroking the air and withdraws his hands, laughing guiltily. Somewhere behind him, he hears a voice. In Even Dogs in the Wild there is a small dog, a wire-haired terrier, astray in Cafferty's neighborhood. After several visits there, Rebus takes the dog home and, finding that no-one else wants a dog, adopts it. During its time boarding with a vet it acquired the name Brillo. Even so, I never felt this was a question of genetics as much as it was learned behavior. The nature vs. nurture question has always felt sort of beside the point. I mean, it's obvious to me that while some personality traits are clearly handed down from parent to child (case in point, I have my dad's social awkwardness and my mom's passive-aggressiveness – a winning combo!), much of the way we act day-to-day has everything to do with the way we were taught – explicitly or implicitly, by parents and other sources – to make our way in the world. I was taught by my parents to be civil and to err on the side of kindness, and those are two lessons that have served me well. As I grew older, I was able to extrapolate that into an understanding that I should appreciate diversity, keep an open mind, and, above all else, try to remember that not everyone sees the world the way I do. I don't think I won any kind of genetic lottery; I just know my parents and the way they tried to raise my brother and me.I was surprised and touched to read in the intro that the title is a reference to a Joy Division song - I had assumed that it referred in some way to Gogol.

The first series starred John Hannah as the title character; and was co-produced by Hannah's own production company, Clerkenwell Films. After Hannah quit, the role was re-cast with Ken Stott appearing in three subsequent series, produced in-house by STV. He is initially introduced as a Detective Sergeant, and is promoted to Detective Inspector early in the series.

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Detective Constable Christine Esson is part of the Gayfield Square police station CID starting with Saints of the Shadow Bible (2013). She is a social media expert. Rebus thinks she looks like Audrey Hepburn ( In a House of Lies, Chapter 25). She works with databases and, when cold cases necessitate it, archives, researching leads not only for DI Siobhan Clarke but also for Rebus, who may or may not have any official status at Gayfield. She is paired with another detective, Ronnie Ogilvie. Each strand has a mystery at its core - who is the blond girl that the Misper is last seen with, is the psycho responsible for a 20 year cold case and who is the third man in the paedo case?

This is my fifteenth John Rebus novel, and before starting this book I had a question in my mind. When an author as successful as Rankin has been with his tough and idiomatic Scottish thrillers, a problem sets in after several books: how to keep the formula fresh?Dead Souls is a 1999 crime novel by Ian Rankin that features Inspector Rebus. The title refers both to Joy Division's song "Dead Souls" and to the 1842 Nikolai Gogol novel Dead Souls; quotes from the latter appear at the beginnings of the two divisions of the book. The novel won the French Grand Prix de Littérature Policière upon its publication there in 2004. One thing is that, after reading a John Rebus' book, I have an anguished feeling of visiting Edinburgh, see all those places describe the author with my own eyes. The series is set in Edinburgh and Rankin displays an unnerving knowledge of, seemingly, how crime works there. Rankin has a very unique of displaying simplistic events. His engrossing words will get under your skin. Detective Sergeant Tess Leighton is part of the Major Incident Team headed by Detective Chief Inspector Graham Sutherland in In a House of Lies and A Song for the Dark Times. She is tall, slim, pale, intelligent, and interested in men. She and Malcolm Fox have a few dates. Her colleagues on this team in the two books include DS George Gamble and DC Phil Yeats. Detective Constable Grant Hood is a police officer who was based at St Leonards. He is a big fan of new technology and gadgets. During The Falls he is attracted to Siobhan Clarke, and attempts to kiss her. During the same novel he takes on a media liaison role, a position he takes up in a number of subsequent investigations.