DCC Bob Skinner has a failed marriage on his hands, and a death on his conscience, but little time to deal with either as he faces the biggest challenge of his career within the secret corridors where dark power is wielded.
As Bob Skinner's biggest investigation develops, he goes to the very top - the Prime Minister - lest he himself becomes collateral damage. Meanwhile, back in Edinburgh, Skinner's daughter is being harassed by a stalker. Can he protect her? A bookmaker has taken one gamble too many and paid his debt in a gruesome fashion. Is it an underworld vendetta, or something more sinister? Alongside it all, a casual call to the Chief Constable sets him on a personal crusade which quickly points to a bigamist at work. Or is it worse? Four crimes, four crises: can Skinner and his people solve them? Indeed, can they survive them?
Quintin Jardine was born once upon a time in the West - of Scotland rather than America, but still he grew to manhood as a massive Sergio Leone fan. On the way there he was educated, against his will, in Glasgow, where he ditched a token attempt to study law for more interesting careers in journalism, government propaganda, and political spin-doctoring. After a close call with the Brighton Bomb in 1984, he moved into the even riskier world of media relations consultancy, before realising that all along he had been training to become a crime writer. Now, forty novels later, he never looks back.
Along the way he has created/acquired an extended family in Scotland and Spain. Everything he does is for them.
He can be tracked down through his blog: http://quintinjardine.me