A Small Death in the Great Glen

Joanne Ross #1

by A.D. Scott

In the Highlands of 1950s Scotland, a boy is found dead in a canal lock. Two young girls tell such a fanciful story of his disappearance that no one believes them. The local newspaper staff—including Joanne Ross, the part-time typist embroiled in an abusive marriage, and her boss, a seasoned journalist determined to revamp the paper—set out to uncover and investigate the crime. Suspicion falls on several townspeople, all of whom profess their innocence. Alongside these characters are the people of the town and neighboring glens; a refugee Polish sailor; an Italian family whose cafÉ boasts the first known cappuccino machine in the north of Scotland; and a corrupt town clerk subverting the planning laws to line his own pocket.

Together, these very different Scots harbor deep and troubling secrets underneath their polished and respectable veneers—revelations that may prevent the crime from being solved and may keep the town firmly in the clutches of its shadowy past.

 

Genres: Mystery, Scotland, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical, Historical Mystery, Book Club

393 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Pen name of Ann Deborah Nolan.

A. D. Scott was born in the Highlands of Scotland and educated at Inverness Royal Academy and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. She has worked in theatre, in magazines, and as a knitwear designer and currently lives in Vietnam and north of Sydney, Australia.

Reviews

[Richard Derus · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pearl Ruled (chapter 10)

Horrible. I got through chapter 10 by dint of sheer will. Bad writing, predictable plotting, and nothing redeeming about it. It gets one star because it is, after all, a book. Save yourself the misery: Avoid.


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Busy. If I had to pick one word to describe Scott's debut, it might be "busy." As in too much going on. As in trying to do too much. She gets top marks for an amazing number of interesting characters and for their development, as well as for her ability to evoke a solid sense of Scotland in the 1950s. The main plot is extremely interesting, but an abundance of secondary and even tertiary story lines cause the pacing of the book to suffer and creates an overall inconsistency in the final result. In addition to the main murder story, there are at least two subplots involving the main female protagonist and another involving her editor at the local paper. And there are others, as well. There is a wedding to be planned and executed, told in great detail. There is Scotland's version of a gypsy group and the way that it is treated by the xenophobic locals. There is a weekly newspaper to put out, with time and pages devoted to the details of getting that job done. And on an on. And while each story with its subset of characters is interesting in its own right, there is just too much of it, and it takes the story away from the main murder mystery too often and for excessive periods of time. Perhaps it would have been wiser to save a subplot or two for the second book in the series. I was left with the sense that the author was trying to accomplish too much. Sometimes less is more, and all that.

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first of the series. I did read the second book first. Like Ian Rankin, A.D. Scott's crime/mystery stories are about much more than the plot itself. The story takes place in a tiny town in the Scottish Highlands, far from Glasgow and Edinburgh in 1957. Joanne Ross is a young mother working at the local weekly paper, first as a secretary but slowly beginning to write stories as well, much to her abusive husband's disdain. The newspaper itself is going through a transformation as well, changing from only local stories to a serious news driven paper, under their new editor McAllister.
The plot is focused around the very sad death of little boy. In such a small town, suspicions are cast upon recent residents, and especially those residents that are not Scottish born. The local Tinker community also come under suspicion as they are accused of harbouring a suspect.
I really enjoyed this story and the atmosphere of the book. It is very unfamiliar place and time and yet some of the problems and joys of the book are timeless and could happen anywhere.
Edited to add: One of the things that was a bit tricky was some of the Scottish words (or perhaps some of them were specifically Highland words?)For instance: Dwam (daydream or fugue state), Dreich (drizzly, grey, cold, weather), Bourach (can mean a hill but also slangly a huge mess), Mauchit (dirty, filthy), Coorie (snuggle), Peely-Wally (pale, ill looking), Neb (nose or beak, can also refer to being inquistive {nosy}), Lug (ear). Most were easy to figure out because of context, and those that weren't I simply looked up online and was happy to add some new words to my vocabulary.

[Leo · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thought of DNFing this a few times during reading this, don't know why I continued this to be honest. This was set in Scottish highlands and during 1950s so had big hopes for it but this wasn't really my cup of tea.

[Paul Pessolano · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the 1950's in a small town in the Scottish Highlands a young child is found dead in a canal. At first everyone thought it was an accident until a young girl tells the story of his being snatched by the "hoodie crow". It is then that they find that the child not only was murdered, but that he was also interfered (molested). The two main suspects in the case is a Polish seaman who has jumped ship and is being harbored by the "tinkers" (gypsies), and a Catholic priest whose background has been in helping children.

The force behind the investigation is the local newspaper, the "Highland Gazette". The paper is put out by several very interesting people. John McAllister, a seasoned reporter who is trying to revamp the paper, who is haunted by his past when the young man's death comes very close to his own personal experience. There is also the part time typist, Joanne Ross, who is trying to bring up her children in an abusive marriage.

Although the story is built around the murder of a young child, the book tells a much larger story. A vivid and lasting picture of the staid, bleak, and sometimes wonderful existence that is portrayed of the Scolttish Highlands and its people. The prejudices of a small town are also brought out when the Polish seaman (an outsider) is accused of the crime, and an Italian family (long time residents but also considered outsiders) comes under attack because of a supposed connection to the crime. One of the more memorable parts of the novel is the description of an Italian wedding. Even if you are not Italian you will love the pageantry and familial description of the wedding.

The "Gazette" and it's reporters keep working on the child's murder and come up with some strange and confusing clues that lead them to the murderer, a person no one suspects.

A wonderful read that may well be a "step up" in the mystery/thriller category. At the end of the novel there are a lot of unanswered questions concerning the inhabitants of the "bonnie wee glen". The answers could well be in her sequel comming out in the summer of 2011.

[kari · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm giving this one a 3, but it is really more a 2.5. However 2 is for a book I don't like and I did enjoy some parts of this one.
First the langage was a bit difficult. Now while they speak English, there are bits of slang and terms that I didn't know and many of them aren't explained. That made for some rough reading. I've read other books that can giver the language and flavor of a place while still being very readable.
There seem to be too many characters so that none of them are really developed. Joanne, who we are told is one of the main characters (which I guess she was, sort of) and helps solve the crime, but she doesn't do anything to solve the death of the small boy. She is wrapped up in her own problems with an abusive husband. She was a character about whom I'd have liked to know more. In fact, all of the main characters left me more curious than anything.
There are several usual red herrings and of those some are better developed than others.
I think the biggest problem I have is that there wasn't really any tension. This was a book you could easily put down. There wasn't anything pulling me in and making me want to keep reading to the end. I could have easily left unfinished and not felt I missed out on anything.
The book kind of meanders along, telling about a wedding, and Halloween and dances and various everyday occurances. A little local color to add to the story goes a long way and I'd have gladly lost some description of the hills and rivers and more character development and a tighter story.
All in all, it isn't bad, but it could definitely be better.

[Charlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

First of a series of 6 mysteries set in the Inverness of the 1950s, where modern times are slowing arriving. I like the newspaper setting of the books, with the journalists as investigators of crime. But the best part of book is the Scottish landscape and weather, the strong sense of place..

[Hilary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is quite an immersion into a small Highlands town in 1956, where the circumstances of the boy's death are only a small part of the picture. There's the hidden xenophobia which goes beyond the expected "if you're not third generation, you're a newcomer" prejudice against both foreigners and the Travellers (tinkers), the struggles of a new (and Glaswegian!) editor to bring the local paper up into at least the late 19th century, the blindness to domestic abuse, and Joanne's balance between the job she's beginning to love and the social stress it causes her.

Woven amongst all of it are the threads of secrecy, love and friendship as the characters learn and grow, or have change forced upon them. As someone who's been away from Scotland for some time now I found the Scots dialect and customs refreshing, like coming home after a long day and sinking into an old comfy chair with a cup of tea.

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I thought the beginning was a bit slow going, it picked up nicely and ended up being a good, solid mystery set in one of my favorite settings, the Highlands of Scotland. A.D. Scott did an excellent job of revealing the characters, their lives and personalities. There was a nice twist in the plot, while not obvious, also not far-fetched. Connections between the present day murder of a young boy and past incidents of child abuse were developed with care, revealing interesting details about the main characters, as well as motivation for murder. There is much happening in this novel, and the author blends it all together into an engaging story. Murder, child abuse, domestic abuse, journalistic endeavors, women's advancement, and more supply depth and substance. A Small Death in the Great Glen is the first in what promises to be a murder mystery series well worth following.

[Andy Weston · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in Inverness and the Highlands of Scotland in the mid 1950s this is a murder mystery that though written in 2010 manages to capture the atmosphere of that time really well.
An 8 year old boy is found dead in the canal, and local people including the police are quick to make assumptions in a time when foreigners are viewed with suspicion, and there is a general lack of belief that any of their own small community could be guilty. With the setting of the Highlands in winter it may be assumed this is a ‘cosy’ mystery, but it is anything but, with recurring themes of abuse, both physical and sexual. Scott’s writing makes the novel stand out from its many counterparts.
“We know that evil exists. I try not to see it, but it is there, in big and small ways. And always balanced by good.”
...says one of the local community, indicating perhaps an eternal optimism typical of that period just after the war, but to a degree also, she is sticking her head in the sand. As well as a time of recovery and reconciliation the 1950s was a time when many women were hurt by the partners and chose to remain silent, and many children suffered abuse in institutions with society refusing to believe that such things were possible.
Yet she manages to write with tongue in cheek humour as well, and the novel needs these few brighter moments,
Umbrellas are not favoured by the Scottish people, despite the precipitous weather.

[Shomeret · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't particularly like the 1950's, so I didn't expect to be able to read and enjoy this novel. I liked the Scottish cultural content and I admired the inner strength of the female protagonist, Joanne Ross. It's odd to have a protagonist who is not the detective and who doesn't investigate the case when the book is a mystery. The actual investigator of the case is a reporter at the newspaper where she works. The problems with prejudice in this small Scottish town reminded me of a similar small town in England in the Maisie Dobbs novel An Incomplete Revengeby Jacqueline Winspear. This is nowhere near as good as An Incomplete Revenge, but it is a first novel. I liked the way this book was resolved and I'm willing to read the sequel.

[BookAddict · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought this was a fabulous read. It was a hard read because of the subject matter but a well written mystery/police procedural. In some ways it is as dense and dark as Rennie Airth's series with not quite the same command of language that Airth has, but pretty close. I may decide to tackle the series based on this first book.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rarely read mysteries but enjoyed the language and characters here. Like taking a quick (hard-to-put-down) trip to Scotland in the late 50's. Reminded me of a tamer (less sex and no time travel!) Outlander world.

[Stuart · Rating 2 out of 5]

A first novel from A D Scott. I was unfortunately disappointed. It had many elements that I was interested in, even associated with – the Scottish 1950’s. But as a whole, I felt the book failed. I found that it tried to be too Scottish, bringing out every possible bad stereotype of 1950’s Scottish life and emphasizing them. Yes, it wasn’t the 21st century, but I felt that the elements as described just didn’t sit as a natural entity. And while trying to be 1956, the book ending up bringing in too many 21st century overtones.

The story is built around the death of a young boy from the town, who is found dead in the local canal. The police execute on their prejudices and pin the murder on a local foreigner with the travelling people as accomplices. “It couldn’t have been locals”. The main protagonists of the story work in the local newspaper, which the new editor, from Glasgow, is trying to modernize. They gradually uncover facts leading to the solution, which in itself is also unsatisfactory, being delivered in a rush in the last chapter.

The story spends much less time on the boy’s murder than on the town’s prejudices and secrets. Everyone dislikes foreigners, and tinkers. The various religious denominations don’t trust each other. The editor’s brother died under suspicious circumstances, the office typist is being beaten by husband and so on.
It could have been a good book, but there were too many distractions. Maybe the next one will be better, now the author has got the overt Scottishness out of the way.

[Carol · Rating 1 out of 5]

I liked the idea of the story. If the author had stuck with the book flap summary it could have been good. If it were a story about Joanne, her abusive husband and her two little girls who had information about the missing boy I would have enjoyed it. There was too much going on. I actually skipped over the parts when it went off subject gambling that it was going nowhere anyway. I was right.
The first page of the book was so confusing to me that I read and reread it. Was the woman named Flora? Who is Joanne?Are there two women standing there and one is sightless? Is the dog named Joanne? Who is flying with the gull? Was the author trying to be over-poetic?
Lately I have read too many books that have way too many overlapping stories. I don't know if it is supposed to be a sign of greatness among authors to be successful at handling twenty characters each with their own story, but for me it is always what ruins it. Stephen King's 944 page book 11/22/63 kept his characters nicely bundled where each little sub-story belonged. It was easy to follow and I loved the book. I am starting to read the one and two star reviews before I begin a book so that I am forewarned and I won't waste my time.

[Shannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have read this series backwards! After finishing all the other books, I suddenly realized that I had never read this one, the first of the group! Better late than never, this proved to be a very solid introductory mystery, starring the Highland Gazette team of: McAllister (editor-in-chief, fresh from a big-city paper in Glasgow,) ) Don McLeod (subeditor and long-time fixture at the newspaper,) Rob McLean (reporter-at-large and eager youth,) and Joanne Ross (typist and cub reporter, trying to avoid an abusive husband as much as possible!)
The story revolves around a horrible child-murder that takes place in an insular Highland town (thinly veiled Inverness,) during 1956. As the story unfolds, the search for the killer turns to outlier groups, such as the Romany family of the McPhees (the local "gypsies,") as well as the two Polish foreigners, each of whom is arrested at some point. A couple of sour threads running through the narrative were the deterioration of Joanne's marriage as well as the continuing agony of Mcallister's brother's suicide. Interspersed between bouts of drama and trouble, there are plenty of lighter moments and detailed descriptions of folk-tales and customs.
My criticisms are: that is is overlong and would have benefited from some trimming. There was much redundancy which led to confusion between old memories and current events. And perhaps, even worse, was the solution and conclusion both left much to be desired. I felt the ending was very forced, as a way to create a surprise ending, that was simply unbelievable. It was so unsatisfactory, that it lost the book a whole rating star.
Still, I recommend this series to readers who enjoy their mysteries with some brooding Scottish atmosphere. Believe me, you will never hear the term "hoodie crow" without shuddering!

[Reid · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a wonderful surprise! I was browsing in the library and there it was…a mystery set in the Highlands of Scotland. Small town, 1956. So I checked it out, went home, made myself a strong cup of tea, and settled in my reading chair to give it a go.

It was one of those books that I enjoy most. An inside look and immersion into a very interesting people and place. I liked the different words the Scots use, all of them understandable in the context of the story, my favorite being “dwam” (a daydream, sort of). And all sorts of small town happenings and events. And the weather and the land, and family.

The mystery centered on four staff at a small town newspaper who investigate the most unfortunate death of a small boy. I liked all four of them very much,especially Joanne Ross. Each of the four characters were well developed, flaws and all.

So, several days and more cups of tea later, I finished reading the novel. I felt like I had visited a place that I liked very much. If you have ever seen the movie Brigadoon, then you know what I mean.

The ending of the novel was quite interesting.

[Melanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some good characters and well described time period. The down side of this novel was that the story line wandered a lot so that it was difficult to pick up and put down. Perhaps the next in the series is better edited.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good story. I enjoyed the author's style, the setting and the cultural references. There were a LOT of characters; trying to keep them straight was a challenge. It was well a plotted with some unexpected twists.
I'm looking forward to reading the next book in this series.

[Kris (My Novelesque Life) · Rating 3 out of 5]

A SMALL DEATH IN THE GREAT GLEN (The Highland Gazette: #1)
Written by A.D. Scott
2010, Atria Books (416 pages)
Genre: mystery, historical, fiction, Scotland, mystery

Rating: ★★★

When trying to figure out if Low Road was part of a series (and if yes what number) I found that there were two names for the series. On A.D. Scott's website she calls the series The Highland Gazette mysteries after the newspaper publication where five of the main characters work. Most other book sites call this series Joanne Ross after one of the characters in the novel. While we do get more details on Joanne in the first book, I am with Scott and like to refer to the series as The Highland Gazette mysteries.

Speaking of details....there are a LOT of descriptions, explanations and hearing every though a character has in the first book, A Small Death in the Great Glen. The novel takes place in the Highlands of Scotland in the 1950s and opens with a young boy's body being found in the canal lock. The young boy, Jamie was friends with Joanne Ross' daughters, Annie and Wee Jean. That is where the mystery sort of stops and the descriptions of each character in the novel begins. While I am nosey and like the back story of characters I found it very tedious and almost got to the point where I stopped reading. While the mystery runs through the novel it is not the focal point of the book. The focal point is Joanne Ross - wife, mother and part-time typist at the Highland Gazette - and how she has to overcome her abusive husband, being shunned by her minister father, being a disappointment to her mother-in-law and being though of as thinking above her station by the rest of the town. Her only real friends are Italian born immigrants, the Corelli family and the people she works with and for. Then we meet Rob McLean, reporter and son of a barrister. He is young, wild and ambitious. Also on the paper is Don McLeod -the gruff editor and team leader- and then their is dependable Mrs. Smart who takes care of advertising and other tasks with Joanne. Finally, rounding out the team is MacAllister, the boss and sort of love interest of Joanne. Do not fear you will get every single detail of each of these characters and even some secondary and very minor players.

So why did I continue to read this book? Well, there are two reasons why I had to keep trying with this dense novel. One of the reasons was that I had read reviews on this book and many said it was dense but was worth it because the second book is amazing. That intrigued me and once I got reading I wanted to see if that was true because It was taking me forever to get through the first one. The second reason I pursued the novel was because of Mrs. Smart - who we don't get much about so I wanted to see what was going on there and if Joanne would smarten up and kick her husband to the curb.

The end result was yes they do remember they have to solve the murder and with all the information given about people, places and things I will not have to do research ever on 1950s Highlands. The next book better be amazing or I am giving up!


My Novelesque Life

[Michelle]

A Small Death in the Great Glen is one of those novels I wanted to like more than I did. It is easy to see what Ms. Scott was trying to accomplish. She was hoping to create a different type of detective novel, one that addresses some of the social issues of the time while solving a mystery. Unfortunately, with it being part murder mystery, part social commentary, part personal discovery, and part cultural exploration, there was too much occurring at the same time. Consequently, the book lost its focus several times throughout the course of the novel, and the entire novel suffered.

The largest weaknesses are its pacing and the sheer number of characters. Subplots are fine and important to novels, but some subplots were drawn out through the entire novel while others were resolved within a chapter. The result is a jagged story that speeds up and slows down at uneven intervals that have no bearing on the overarching story. Also, there are a LOT of major and even more minor characters in this novel that each have their own back story and subplot. There is simply too many to track, and the reader quickly becomes confused. Any time a reader becomes confused or has to backtrack to try to remember who was doing what, the story loses some of its hold on the reader.

Having grown up in the Scottish Highlands, Ms. Scott does a fantastic job of presenting her birth location in all its glory. Infusing a lot of the colloquialisms into the dialogues adds a sense of authenticity to the story, lending an air of charm to some of the proceedings. The reader gets a picturesque and honest idea of what it was like to live in the Scottish highlands in the 1950s, replete with attitudes and atmosphere. A Small Death in the Great Glen is not a novel that adapts its setting to fit more modern thinking but rather forces the reader to adapt to a more historical mindset. Challenging but at the same time informative, this is where the novel shines.

At times slow to the point where it is interesting, at other times where so much happens in a few short pages that the reader needs to pause to catch one's breath, A Small Death in the Great Glen is a uneven novel. Ms. Scott deserves accolades for tackling a very difficult subject matter, but it would have been more effective had it not been buried as a subplot. Even more important, there should have been greater focus on main characters versus minor ones. With such a large cast, the distinction is lost, and the reader cannot determine which subplots require the greater attention. Its presentation of the Scottish highlands is superb, but the jaggedness of the story bogs down the entire novel. This is unfortunate because there are moments of brilliance; they just happened to buried under too much clutter for them to shine appropriately.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book introduces this unusual series set in post-World-War-II Scotland. Most of the characters are employees at The Highland Gazette, a very old-fashioned newspaper that has historically reported on local society, events and sports. Its new editor, McAllister, has ambitions to drag the paper into the 20th century. He is assisted by hard-core newspaperman Don, and two eager newbie reporters.
Joanne is the only woman in the newsroom, and mostly types the work of the three men. But she has begun to think about other possibilities. Her husband is a brute, who came home from the war a different man than the one she married in a rush after getting pregnant. Now Joanne has two daughters to worry about, and struggles to fit into an insular and disapproving community. Can she dare to leave a bad marriage?
But it's her daughter Annie at the center of this tale. A doorbell ringing game led to the disappearance of a school friend, young Jamie, and Annie's tale of a "hoodie crow" (a sort of universal bogieman of Scots storytelling) sweeping up the boy and carrying him away isn't given much credence... until Jamie's body is found under the canal bridge. Worse, the authorities learn he was molested and killed.
The arrest of a Polish man who jumped off a Russian trawler in the port town leads to harassment and shunning of immigrant businesses. Meanwhile, Jamie's story has raised bad memories for McAllister, whose own brother died an apparent suicide. When suspicions around a Catholic priest grow, McAllister's hunt for the person responsible for his brother's despair becomes tangled with the hunt for the truth about Jamie's death.
I really enjoy the characters and setting of these books. The mix of formal older professionals, the Traveler community, immigrant newcomers, and WWII veterans makes for a pretty fair sampling of the changes that upended old social mores and beliefs in the post-war 20th century. Recommended.

[Phoebe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Scott's leisurely novel is a mystery, but she approaches the genre through the careful development of characters and setting. The authentic flavor is charming, with phrases and description that may be unfamiliar to anyone who is not Scottish, and details like holiday preparations are fascinating. But be warned that this is not a cozy village whodunit. The mystery revolves around the apparent drowning of a frail 8 year old boy, who disappears one night, taken up by a terrifying "hoodie crow" in the description of two little girls who witnessed the event. Their mother is a battered wife working as a part time secretary at the local newspaper, and McAllister, the editor of the newspaper, along with the rest of the village, discounts the death as a tragedy but just one of those things. Then events in McAllister's own past begin to trouble him, and he realizes that there may be some horrible connection to this new death. The time period during which the novel is set is key, long before today's larger awareness of domestic abuse and circumstances in which child molestation often occurs. Adult.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in the 1956 in the Highlands of Scotland this mystery held my attention to the end. A young boy is found dead in a canal, initially thought to be an accidental drowning. The two girls he walks home from school with tell of a hoodie crow taking him, and when it is found he was molested it becomes a murder investigation. The girls' mother works for the local newspaper, she and the newspaper staff seem more interested in finding the person responsible than the local police. Blame is placed on a Polish immigrant who had just jumped a Russian ship, but there is no shortage of other possible suspects. The author leads you to believe the local Catholc priest is the perpetrator but you'd be wrong if that's who you thought was guilty.

I haven't read many books set in Scotland. I had no idea that Italians had settled in parts of Scotland and just as the U.S. had internmet camps for Japanese Americans Scotland had them for Italian Scots. In 1956 there was still a decided anti-Italian setiment in the Highlands area of Scotland.

[AngryGreyCat · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book begins with the death of a small boy and the dumping of his body. In the course of the story, we meet Joanne, a typist at the village newspaper, her children, who knew the dead boy and know something about the boy’s death, McAllister, a newspaper man, Peter, a Polish man about to be married to Chiara, an Italian girl in the village, and a multitude of other characters with their own lives and stories. The multiple stories incorporate domestic violence, feminism, the treatment of women in 1950s, catholism, corruption, prejudice and intolerance, child abuse and the murder that begins the mystery.

I figured out what the “hoodie crow” was about very early on, but that crime didn’t even seem to be to the main focus of the story. There were just too many competing storylines and most of them are not mysteries. I think I would have enjoyed this more if there was less going on and more focus on the mystery and the investigation.

[Sandra Frey · Rating 4 out of 5]

But maybe more like a strong 3.5. I obsessively love Scotland and enjoyed this book's strong sense of place. I also liked the plot overall. I struggled a bit with the pacing or, more specifically, how much of the pacing relied on people being unwilling to believe certain things or not letting themselves dare to think certain things. This was, to some extent, a function of the strong sense of place--a small, orderly town with somewhat rigid values and provincial expectations. But it began to frustrate me as a mechanism of drawing out questions. Dealer's choice whether I was more frustrated with the book or with small, provincial towns, but the bottom line is that I think the book could have stood to be a bit shorter.

[Marty · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a Goodread win, and I must say one of the best I have received. The story takes place in a small town in Scotland. At times it seems there are to many characters involved, but after a while, it is easy to keep track, and of their story lines.
This is not just a murder mystery, but about how the town interacts and how they live their lives. Other than a few Scottish words, this could be any town.
I would not call the ending a surprise, but it is different than your usual story.
I liked the writting and how the story flowed. It developed over time and pages, and I found the story compelling, enjoyable and worth reading.

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second time I've read this book and I had forgotten how wonderful it was. Set in the still-small city of Inverness in the mid 1950's, it features a wonderfully diverse cast of characters who work in the small weekly newspaper, the Highland Gazette. I admit to being a Scot-a-phile, and have loved Inverness and the Highlands since my first visit in 1972. In addition to the wonderful characters and steadily increasing tension of the plot, the descriptions of the landscape, the people and the culture in a changing time are vivid and delicious. There are 6 books in the series, and I am already reading the next one. And looking around for a fish and chips stand!

[patricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Small Death in Great Glen by A.D. Scott was suspenceful and riveting. You might have difficulty with some of the Scottish expressions used, you can however figure it out. The child's death in the Highlands of the 50's gives you a look into that world.
there are lots of characters that you can easily follow. Secrets, disbelief in what the children say they saw, the lives and problems of the characters are all there. The death has roots in the past. I plan to read the next book and hope it is just as good.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

"A lyrical and haunting debut novel about secrets, families, and the forces of good and evil that dwell in every small town."
~~back cover

This book was not at all what I expected. Yes, there was a mystery, but it's more about life in a small town in Scotland in the 1950s. A small town where people are still "inbred", narrow minded, set in their ways, firmly prejudiced, etc. Fascinating, watching all that evolve. And it ended with several threads unresolved ... ah, but I see this is just the first book of a series!