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The Complaints (Malcolm Fox #1)

3.77 of 5 stars 3.77 · rating details · 3,532 ratings · 464 reviews

Nobody likes The Complaints--they're the cops who investigate other cops. It's a department known within the force as "The Dark Side," and it's where Malcolm Fox works. He's a serious man with a father in a nursing home and a sister who persists in an abusive relationship, frustrating problems about which he cannot seem to do anything.

Then the reluctant Fox is given a new...more

Hardcover, 448 pages

Published March 7th 2011 by Reagan Arthur Books (first published 2009)

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May 15, 2013 Anton rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

“The Complaints” is about a Scottish police detective named Malcolm Fox. Fox works for Complaints and Conduct, which is the Scottish equivalent of internal affairs. Fox’s team has just concluded a successful investigation on a local cop, putting their popularity with their fellow officers at an all-time low.

Fox is asked to assist in a child pornography case, one where another local cop has been implicated. The thinking is that Complaints has more far reaching investigative authority. Unfortunate...more

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Apr 10, 2013 William rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read this after the second book in the Malcolm Fox series ("The Impossible Dead"). My reaction is about the same. These are page-turners with pretty stock characters. After two books, I still can't find many distinguishing characteristics for Fox except he is a large guy and a teetotaler because of past alcohol problems.

And, of course, like so many police procedural protagonists, he breaks the rules. Breaks them a lot. I got somewhat tired of the fact that time after time Fox is told not to do...more

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Sep 15, 2012 Allan MacDonell rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ian Rankin’s Detective Inspector John Rebus, of the Edinburgh homicide department, is upon initial encounter, and long after, one of the freshest flawed heroes in crime fiction. Rebus is a juicer, a failure with relationships in general and a bane to specific women, a pain in the ass to his bosses, peers and underlings, a moody Celt given to bestirring the atmospheric misgivings of his brooding soul with the bulky melancholy of Scots troubadour of disquietude Jon Martyn’s most daunted album, Gra...more

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Jun 02, 2012 Diane rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Complaints, by Ian Rankin, is the first in a new series after Ian Rankin retired Inspector John Rebus. Malcolm Fox, a member of "The Complaints," as the internal investigation unit is called, is as far from John Rebus as he can get. He's a recovering alcoholic who lives in a fairly neat house and sees to his aging father and messed-up sister. He is, however, melancholy and always on the outs with his colleagues.

Set in Edinburgh, the background of the city adds to the dark tone of The Compla...more

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May 10, 2012 Pamela rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The narrator of the audio book was fantastic--too bad the book wasn't in the same league.

After reading Rankin's Watchman, I had huge hopes for this. Don't get me wrong. The book wasn't a waste of time. It wasn't bad. It just wasn't anything special.

What had me excited to read it is that it's from the point of view of a detective in the Complaints (or Internal Affairs). How great was it going to be to see things from the other side so to speak? Unfortunately, that didn't happen.

When other poli...more

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Mar 28, 2012 Star (The Bibliophilic Book Blog) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed

The Complaints is about one of the members of the Edinburgh Complaints and Conduct office (think Internal Affairs in the states), Inspector Malcolm Fox. Straight off a hugely successful case against a very corrupt police officer, Fox is asked by another division to investigate a detective for his possible embroilment with a child pornography ring. DS Jamie Breck, the suspect, is also the lead detective investigating the murder of a man named Vince, who is Fox’s sister’s boyfriend. Unfortunately...more

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Mar 11, 2012 Seth Lynch rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: crime

I listened to the Audiobook version of this book narrated by Peter Forbes. He did an excellent job. I’ve generally been impressed by the readers of the audiobooks I have listened to – the free librivox ones aren’t in the same league as the paid for versions (or in my case borrowed from the library versions)

This book has lots of threads which are slowly lain before us as the chapters evolve and then tied up nicely at the end. The story focuses on a member of the police complaints who finds himsel...more

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Feb 06, 2012 Helen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, modern-mystery

One reviewer said that Edinburgh is a character in Ian Rankin's books and I can certainly agree. The streets, the traffic, the buildings, the weather, they all affect the way the story moves. I was in Edinburgh in Sept. of '09 and I laughed out loud when I met the first complaints about the trams. All of Princes Street dug up and our taxi driver gave us a blow by blow about what it had yet to do to George Street. On the last page Malcolm sounds off about all the things that are wrong with the ci...more

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Nov 17, 2011 Ben Dutton rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Crime fiction. I've always been of the impression that it is highly schematic, tightly plotted and more interested in the workings of that plot than the workings of its characters. It is that, and this is such an example. The best crime fiction blends plot with character, and usually ends up saying something about the world we live in today.

Ian Rankin, one of the UK's brightest stars in the crime writing world, made his name with the Rebus novels. I read one of those many years ago, Fleshmarket...more Crime fiction. I've always been of the impression that it is highly schematic, tightly plotted and more interested in the workings of that plot than the workings of its characters. It is that, and this is such an example. The best crime fiction blends plot with character, and usually ends up saying something about the world we live in today.

Ian Rankin, one of the UK's brightest stars in the crime writing world, made his name with the Rebus novels. I read one of those many years ago, Fleshmarket Close, and thought Rankin a good writer - that novel blended crime with social commentary all built around the complex Rebus. Rebus hung up his hat a few years ago. Rankin is now concerned with Malcolm Fox, a man who works for The Complaints - Internal Affairs to you American readers. This is the first of the Fox novels.

The Complaints begins promisingly enough: Malcolm Fox is well drawn. A former alcoholic, he tows a straight line. His sister, Jude, is in an abusive relationship. Their father is in a care home, and neither child visits him as often as they should. The novel I hoped for - how a cop deals with the fact that his sister is in, and wants to remain in, an abusive relationship - was curtailed by the murder of Vince Faulkner, that abusive man. Meanwhile, Fox has been asked to help the CEOP shop (colloquially, the chop shop, a department who investigate sex predators) as they have information that an officer in a department Fox has only just finished investigating has paid to join a child pornography website. That all these disparate storylines will connect is in no doubt: this is a tightly plotted crime novel, written by a master.

Where for me the novel began to fail, was that as the schematics of the crime novel began to take over, and Rankin began to speed towards the climax, the emotional threads become discarded. Rankin has to complete the jigsaw puzzle an show us the full picture of the crime: that doesn’t allow us to engage with character as fully. This is, of course, not Rankin’s fault: it is the way crime fiction works. As an introduction to a new character designed to replace Rebus: it’s not at all bad.

The novel I think Rankin fans are all waiting for though will be the one where Fox squares up to Rebus: a man who surely must have come, at some point, into the target sights of The Complaints.(less)

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Oct 17, 2011 Maddi Sojourner rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery

Four and a half stars.

Ian Rankin retired his series detective, John Rebus, in Exit Music. This book brings us Detective Inspector Malcolm Fox of "the Complaints," the department that investigates crooked police. It's a fascinating look from the other side, as I've read several police novels where the hero gets investigated on a false charge (including John Rebus).

Edinburgh and surrounding areas are once more brought in all their gritty glory, with the criminal underside to match. Once more, unkn...more

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Oct 12, 2011 Lakis Fourouklas rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It feels kind of strange when you get into your hands a novel by Ian Rankin in which the main character is not good old detective Rebus. However, Rebus or not, this is yet another fine crime novel by one of the best authors of the genre.
The main characters in this story are Malcolm Fox, who leads the Complaints & Conduct department of the Edinburgh police force, widely known as The Complaints, and Jamie Breck, a cop who is suspected of being a member of a pedophile ring. Having just brought...more It feels kind of strange when you get into your hands a novel by Ian Rankin in which the main character is not good old detective Rebus. However, Rebus or not, this is yet another fine crime novel by one of the best authors of the genre.
The main characters in this story are Malcolm Fox, who leads the Complaints & Conduct department of the Edinburgh police force, widely known as The Complaints, and Jamie Breck, a cop who is suspected of being a member of a pedophile ring. Having just brought to its conclusion a very difficult case Fox feels utterly exhausted, but there’s no time for him to take a rest. He has to find out what is going on with Breck and help out his alcoholic sister as well, who’s boyfriend have started abusing her yet again.
Trying to find a balance between his professional and personal lives he seems to be moving back and forth all the time, and that just seems to be tearing him apart. Sometimes he even thinks that he doesn’t have a life; not really. With his sister being who she is and his father in a facility for the elders, with no love life at all and his everyday battle with the department politics, he seems to be at a dead end. But, he keeps going. And in this he looks just like Rebus. He moves all over the city, from end to end, and he visits construction sites, pubs, casinos and some underworld joints, working hard to figure things out, until, all of a sudden, he comes to realize that someone is trying to frame him for a crime. Who is he though? And why does he target him? His career seems to be hanging on a thin thread and he becomes more suspicious by the minute. He no longer knows who to trust. In the end he’ll get all the help he needs from the most unlikely source, and the two of them together, will do everything they possibly can to bring the truth to light.
While all that is happening, a successful businessman simply vanishes from the face of the earth, or rather the sea, and everyone thinks that he committed suicide, since he suddenly lost all his fortune because of the collapse of the economy. Fox accidentally bumps into his case and thinks that there’s more to his disappearance than what at first meets the eye. The author, given the chance, talks excessively about the problems of the modern Scottish society: the extreme poverty, the high rates of crime and unemployment, the alcoholism.
The element of love is not absent from this story, or should I say, the element of unfulfilled love, as Fox meets an attractive woman that keeps herself more than busy working on cases that have to do with pedophilia and child pornography , and whom awakens in him some long forgotten feelings. He comes to believe that in her he met a sister soul, someone who can really get him; however both of their lives are so complicated, and the baggage they carry from the past so heavy that is virtually impossible to make things work; unless, of course, life has different plans for them.
The Complaints is a well crafted novel, which the fans of the good writer will surely enjoy. As it seems, there’s life after Rebus after all.
(less)

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Jul 27, 2011 Wilde Sky rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Its 2009, Edinburgh is a place of plummeting land and property prices. Malcolm Fox, heads the Complaints Conduct Department team (investigating “bent” policemen). Fox is asked to investigate Jamie Breck, an officer whose credit card details have came up in an investigation into a dodgy website. Simultaneously, Fox’s sister's boyfriend is found murdered. Fox is told to stay away from the investigation, which is being handled by Jamie Breck!

The first two thirds of this book were extremely good, re...more

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Jun 30, 2011 Juicy Fruit rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: entertaining, mystery

This was quite a nice read... admittedly, an airplane read, however it was enjoyable. I had never read anything by Rankin so I have no terms of comparison here, but I thought it was relatively well written, no major plot-holes and most importantly, not that predictable. I may not be very well versed in this genre, but I liked it.

I think the major disappointment was the lack of more gruesome details and of dramatic events. The book is quite mellow-paced and the plot development is very laid back...more

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Jun 20, 2011 Kathy Davie rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: suspense

The Story
The Complaints opens with Malcolm Fox closing a case against a dirty cop, Glen Heaton, followed by a visit to Child Protection (CEOP) where DS Inglis enlists his aid in investigating a cop, Jamie Breck, accused of pedophilia.

Then the unexpected hits—Vince, Jude's boyfriend, is found murdered and DS Breck is in charge giving Fox the opportunity to get to know his target. And Breck to learn more about his suspect.

This is the point where it feels a bit manufactured. Fox is such a law-abidi...more

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May 22, 2011 Surreysmum rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011, mystery, owned

Rankin isn't in my personal top tier of mystery authors, but I always find him engaging and engrossing enough to pass whatever time needs to be passed in transit. In this case, it was a very long day in the air and in airports, and "The Complaints" filled the bill nicely. I always enjoy the Edinburgh setting, so I'm glad this new detective - if this is the start of a new series - is still operating in that familiar territory. I won't summarize the plot, since it's already competently done many t...more

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May 01, 2011 Kathleen Hagen added it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011-audio-books, 2011-mysteries

The Complaints, by Ian Rankin, B-plus, narrated by Peter Forbes, produced by Hachette Audio, downloaded from audible.com.

The Edinborough police do not like The Complaints - they're the cops who investigate other cops, the internal complaints unit. It's a department known within the force as "The Dark Side," and it's where Malcolm Fox works. He's a serious man with a father in a nursing home and a sister who won’t admit she’s in an abusive relationship even when her brother finds her with an unex...more

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Apr 26, 2011 Jaime rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011, police_procedural

The Complaints is the first book in Rankin’s first series since the end of his Inspector Rebus series in 2007. Malcolm Fox is not like John Rebus; he’s a bit more low-key, and working outside the lines doesn’t come naturally to him. His job in Scotland’s version of Internal Affairs requires that he seek out the cops that step too far over that line.

After he closes a case against one particularly egregious offender, he’s asked to work with another division on a child pornography case. The suspect...more

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Apr 10, 2011 Gretchen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Whoosh! Here comes Ian Rankin again with a superb new character. Matthew Fox, head of the Edinburgh equivalent of America's Internal Affairs, has been suspended from his job along with the young attractive, computer generated role playing game fan Jaime Breck (also a cop). Both are being set up for a fall from grace. Together they unravel a complicated set of circumstances and are returned to their rightful places on the job. But the getting there is the fun (?). Foxy is an interesting character...more

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Mar 14, 2011 Debbie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery

"The Complaints" is a British detective mystery. Despite Fox's job in Complaints, Fox ended up investigating a murder (with some conspiracy thrown in) rather than the ethical behavior of another cop. The details of the job and setting were woven into the story and did a good job of bringing the story alive in my imagination.

There were a few slow spots in the story, and I never felt much suspense since the main character didn't seem upset or scared. The mystery was fairly complex and kept my inte...more

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Jan 28, 2011 Mary Gramlich rated it 5 of 5 stars

THE COMPLAINTS written by Ian Rankin
03/11 - Little, Brown & Company - Hardcover, 448 pages

Where do the good guys finish in the race of life?

Malcolm Fox was one of the good guys. He was a clean cop that monitors the ones that were not always making sure that his principles were upheld. Foxy worked in Edinburgh for the division called The Complaints and Conduct Department and had the character of a slow and steady man making careful decisions and well thought out plans. He took care of his agi...more

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Sep 04, 2010 Cams rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I've always enjoyed Ian Rankin's detective novels starring the dour Inspector Rebus. Rebus has just retired and Ian Rankin has developed a new character, Inspector Fox.

Foxy works for the complaints, which is to say he investigates other police officers. Like Rebus before him, he is a flawed character. This makes him seem very life-like and I think he will grow to be as well loved as the character of Rebus.

The plot is as good as any that's gone before, with clever twists and great secondary chara...more

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May 24, 2010 Ian Mapp rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This got off to a great start and I felt it was an improvement on Doors Open.

The Complaints are the internal affairs of the Edinburgh police force. Having put away a dodgy policeman.... Malcolm Fox is given the task of bringing Jamie Breck to justice. There is a paedophile ring run from Australia and Jamie has joined through his credit card but not yet submitted the 25 pictures for full membership.

This is a great start, not least because Jamie Breck is quite charming and diligent at his job. The...more

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Feb 07, 2010 Lourdes Fernandez Venard rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Insp. John Rebus has retired, so from Rankin we now get a different type of cop: Malcolm Fox, who works for The Complaints and Conduct, the cops who investigate other cops. He and his team have just finished a case involving veteran officer Glen Heaton, meaning The Complaints has stirred up some more anger. Fox is also dealing with his sister, who is being physically abused by her live-in boyfriend, when he's asked to start investigating another cop who worked with Heaton, this time as part of a...more

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Feb 28, 2013 Col rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, r

Blurb........
Nobody likes The Complaints - they're the cops who investigate other cops. Complaints and Conduct Department, to give them their full title, but known colloquially as 'the Dark Side', or simply 'The Complaints'. Malcolm Fox works for The Complaints. He's just had a result, and should be feeling good about himself. But he's middle-aged, sour and unwell. He also has a father in a care home and a sister who persists in an abusive relationship.
In the midst of an aggressive Edinburgh wi...more Blurb........
Nobody likes The Complaints - they're the cops who investigate other cops. Complaints and Conduct Department, to give them their full title, but known colloquially as 'the Dark Side', or simply 'The Complaints'. Malcolm Fox works for The Complaints. He's just had a result, and should be feeling good about himself. But he's middle-aged, sour and unwell. He also has a father in a care home and a sister who persists in an abusive relationship.
In the midst of an aggressive Edinburgh winter, the reluctant Fox is given a new task. There's a cop called Jamie Breck, and he's dirty. Problem is, no one can prove it. But as Fox takes on the job, he learns that there's more to Breck than anyone thinks. This knowledge will prove dangerous, especially when murder intervenes.
Confession time here, I’ve been a devotee of crime fiction for 20-odd years and shock-horror in all that time I have only ever read one book by Ian Rankin! After this venture north of the border that is something I’ll have to address.

The Complaints is the first in what is hopefully going to be another long running series from the author. There’s definitely a second outing for the team, as the back of my edition offers the first chapter in this follow-up, The Impossible Dead. Happily I have a copy of this somewhere at home that will be demanding some attention later on in the year.

I thought the pace was slightly slow in the first half of the book, as Rankin seemed intent on introducing Fox and the team to the reader- mainly Fox. We learn about his family, his problems with alcohol and his job as one of the peeping Toms, spying on his fellow cops. It picked up speed in the second half as all the strands of the investigation came together.

Enjoyable and entertaining with a satisfactory conclusion. Interesting characters throughout, though I was slightly less fond of Breck than Fox.

My wife read this late last year, and it’s good to know we’re on the same page, as she liked it too.

4 from 5

My copy was a bargain obtained from a local charity shop.
(less)

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Dec 16, 2010 Melaszka rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was a bit disappointed with this. It started promisingly - seemed like it was going to involve some meaty moral dilemmas e.g. is morality sticking to the rules, no matter what? Loyalty to family? Loyalty to colleagues? Looking after the vulnerable, even if, strictly speaking, they're in the wrong? Punishing the guilty, even if it's an unofficial, rough justice? Compromising and letting some things go if it's for the greater good?

But it rapidly descended into tartan noir by numbers. Malcolm Fox...more

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Nov 19, 2011 Simon rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-101

3.5 stars ... The first book in Rankin's new series should please fans of his John Rebus novels (which are recommended if you don't know them). Malcolm Fox leads an Edinburgh squad known as "The Complaints", essentially an Internal Affairs team. The plot is too twisty and complex to try to break down here, but Rankin puts us right in the middle of a world where the line between cops and criminals feels awfully thin. At first it might feel like Fox - who doesn't drink and copes with a sister in a...more

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Feb 21, 2011 David Peters rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

How much do I love Ian Rankin’s work? Like most Rankin fans I enjoyed his first non Rebus novel, Doors Open, but found it woefully below the standard that he had set. So as he introduced his latest character Malcolm Fox, another Scottish Police officer trying to do right by the law, I found myself nervously excited that it be good. While it was not Rebus at his best, Fox delivered exactly what I was looking for, especially for a first outing.
Too often the guys who police the Police are often por...more

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Aug 11, 2010 Eric Wright rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ian Rankin's Complaints tells the story of a police department called Complaints, the cops who investigate other cops. Malcolm Fox, the main character, has a frail father and a sister in a compulsive relationship. After investigating and gleaning evidence on another popular cop, his life spirals out of control. His sister abusive live-in is killed. A wealthy but down on his luck developer disappears as if by suicide. A cop is connected to a an internet porn ring out of Australia. Soon Fox doesn'...more

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Feb 21, 2013 Eeeby rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Having been a fan for many years of the Inspector Rebus novels I was very much looking forward to this new offering from Ian Rankin. Unfortunately this is not one of his better novels and the book tends to swing between police corruption and the main character’s personal life which in parts was not entirely believable.

This personal life approach does adopt a similar pattern in the same way as the Rebus novels, however the main character Fox does not offer the same style of characteristics or ind...more

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Jan 13, 2013 Patrick rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the first of Rankin's post-Rebus books that I've read and it feels a little strange to be back at the crime scenes and police stations of Edinburgh in the company of a slightly priggish, by-the-book sort of chap who visits his father at his care home regularly, gave up drinking five years ago, and feels relieved that when lugging his large frame up Waverley Steps, at least he'd never taken up smoking. Malcolm Fox is a well-enough realised character, though I'm not sure I'd want to plough...more

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About Ian Rankin

AKA Jack Harvey.

Born in the Kingdom of Fife in 1960, Ian Rankin graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1982, and then spent three years writing novels when he was supposed to be working towards a PhD in Scottish Literature. His first Rebus novel was published in 1987, and the Rebus books are now translated into twenty-two languages and are bestsellers on several continents.

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Quotes from Complaints

“[About a tiresome colleague]: He could bore for Scotland.” — 6 people liked it

“This was the winter of 2008/9. Work was ongoing to reinstate a tram system in the city. A lot of people couldn’t see the point of trams and many more disliked the disruption. Streets were closed off. There was almost a sense of ‘apartheid’ as the roadworks made it difficult to move from New Town to Old Town and vice versa. Added to which, the weather was fairly grim. And the banks looked ready to implode.” — 2 people liked it

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The Complaints (Malcolm Fox #1)

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