Complex Scottish mystery!
The Art of Dying (DI Wetsphall #3) by Douglas Lindsay
At first I thought what have I let myself in for. A few pages in and I was hooked. I was knee deep in vicious murders, Corporate concerns and Russian intervention. Opening with a litany of deaths caused by the hero seemed a tad daunting, but as I progressed I realized their import.
This is DI Westphall's "line-up of guilt," from his MI6 days. Now they're joined by ghosts from his cases.
This latest investigation begins with a football match death, links somehow to an up market care home and seems to have a whiff of Russian assistance.
Westphall's church attendance is an interesting twist. Is he looking for absolution? Maybe. Release from his guilt? Who knows? His attention is caught by the line from the service, "My blood of the Covenant." My attention is grabbed by the inclusion of one of my favorite hymns, "I the Lord of sea and sky." Oh yes, there's more to this novel than your run-of-the-mill murder mystery story.
A question perhaps? Where shall the man within the police uniform, haunted by his past retreat to?
There Westphall sits looking at a stained glass window portraying the death of Saint Sebastian, "Haunted by a man in a dream who sees everything without being able to see anything at all." And when the minister startles him by commenting on the window with the murmured phrase, ‘The art of dying,' well I'm there!
I'm well and truly caught in the web that is Westphall and that of the intricately layered crimes he's investigating.
A compelling read!
A Hodder & Stoughton ARC via NetGalley
*****
This is DI Westphall's "line-up of guilt," from his MI6 days. Now they're joined by ghosts from his cases.
This latest investigation begins with a football match death, links somehow to an up market care home and seems to have a whiff of Russian assistance.
Westphall's church attendance is an interesting twist. Is he looking for absolution? Maybe. Release from his guilt? Who knows? His attention is caught by the line from the service, "My blood of the Covenant." My attention is grabbed by the inclusion of one of my favorite hymns, "I the Lord of sea and sky." Oh yes, there's more to this novel than your run-of-the-mill murder mystery story.
A question perhaps? Where shall the man within the police uniform, haunted by his past retreat to?
There Westphall sits looking at a stained glass window portraying the death of Saint Sebastian, "Haunted by a man in a dream who sees everything without being able to see anything at all." And when the minister startles him by commenting on the window with the murmured phrase, ‘The art of dying,' well I'm there!
I'm well and truly caught in the web that is Westphall and that of the intricately layered crimes he's investigating.
A compelling read!
A Hodder & Stoughton ARC via NetGalley
*****
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