Absolution

ABSOLUTION is the first book from this Scottish author, with the second - Tambourine to be released 2008. There's obviously something in the water in Scotland - or maybe it's all that time stuck indoors in the long cold winters, but the number of assured, confident books coming out of that place is getting to the startling stage. ABSOLUTION is definitely assured, with a story-telling style that is absolutely enthralling.

The main component of the book is the hunt for the serial killer - the 'Crucifixion Killer'. To be honest it's a pretty standard serial killer plot, with a perpetrator that's not difficult to spot, but the point of the book seems less to do with the crime and a whole lot more to do with the impact of crime on the show more investigators. McAlpine is a truly tortured soul. In the 1984 incident, he was already a fragile man, emotionally drained by events in his own family, and with hindsight, what seemed like an easy job - guarding a dreadfully injured, unknown young woman backfired badly. He becomes so involved in who she is and what happened to her that he is never able to forget, never really recovers.

In the 2006 investigation, his personal fragility is starting to get on top of him - badly. As his team continue the investigation, and try, out of friendship for him and genuine feeling for his wife; to continue the investigation, to compensate for McAlpine; to understand - he falls apart in front of them. His behaviour becomes more and more erratic, his distress less and less controlled.

And it's impact of crime that becomes the main point of ABSOLUTION. The serial killer has victims - those victims have friends and families and associates. And victims aren't necessarily good, or nice, or as ideal as people perhaps think. And investigators can sometimes become victims as well. Whether that's psychological or physical, well we've all seen what happens when investigators put themselves into jeopardy. Only in ABSOLUTION the jeopardy is not what you think, and whilst it might not be hard to work out where the past has leaked into the present, it sometimes ends in ways that you may not expect. show less

PC Alan McAlpine returns to work after a family tragedy and is rostered to hospital duty to wait for the awakening of a young woman who lies near death after being the victim of a horrific acid attack. McAlpine is soon obsessed by the woman and even after discovering what led to her predicament he continues to fantasize about her. Fast Forward 20 years and McAlpine is a Detective Inspector who investigating a series of brutal killings

The opening passages of this book are some of the most moving I have read, in any kind of genre, and perfectly sparked my interest in both the story to come and getting to know McAlpine. Ramsay’s writing is wonderfully descriptive and evocative of the time and place. She builds the suspense well and the show more ending fits logically with the events that went before it which is not always the case with crime fiction these days. There is one thread that I found awkward and unnecessary from a plot development point of view (the car crash) but I can easily forgive this in a book with so much else to recommend it.

The book has a swag of well-developed and interesting characters which is just as well because I grew to despise Alan McAlpine. I suspect readers are supposed to feel sympathetic towards him but I just found him totally self-absorbed and hated the way he treats his wife and friends with utter contempt much of the time. Which presented me with my only real gripe about this book because I could just about swallow that either his wife or one of his colleagues would be blind to McAlpine’s faults but found it too much of a stretch to accept that they would universally put up with his poor treatment of them, cover for his drunken mistakes and generally ignore the fact he’s a selfish ingrate. Happily for him (and the good citizens of Glasgow) the dogged and devoted Colin Anderson and smart, courageous Winifred Costello are available fo the actual police work. Likeable or not though, all the characters are well constructed and nicely multi-dimensional.

I’ll definitely keep my eyes out for any new books by this author. show less

Sometimes I got a bit lost in the story, but it came together well at the end. McAlpine was annoying and I’m glad he died. He was too engrossed in Anna and was too drunk to actually perform his duties, so I can’t see how he was actually working the case in the first place. Anderson and Costello made this book worth reading though and I look forward to the next one

I read this last before the third and second in the series, which was unfortunate. In this story the characters haven’t fully developed in the way they have in books 2 and 3 and I found the character of DCI Alan McAlpine a little unlikely to generate the loyalty often referred to in books 2 and 3. That aside it is still a cracking read and worth it for the back story to the even better books 2 and 3.

This is actually not a new series, the first originally published in 2007, just recently published as an e-book, I think. I will certainly be checking up for more.

A serial killer is acting as a vigilante, targetting women who have betrayed others. So far three have been brutally killed, and there is no sign that "he" is stopping.

It is a complex plot, with clues that seem to lead nowhere. In many ways this is a very solid police procedural. The ending will leave you wondering where the series is heading.

I like to give a new novelist a chance. Started well. A young man's obsession with the woman's left in his care. I just felt she over-extended herself and tried to fit too much in. I had to keep pushing myself to finish the book - there was no real urgency in chasing down the serial killer. Not something I'm passing on to anyone.

Very good book. The main character is a police detective who has never let go of a case of a beautiful woman who had acid thrown on her. She killed herself to save her daughter. 20 years later a killer is on the loose and there are connections to the old case. Although I figured out who was the killer, the ending was not what I expected.