It is July 2005, and DI John Rebus is a year from retirement. “Nobody’d blame you for coasting,” he is told. But he has no such intention, and is soon up against both a serial killer and the crowds protesting against the G8 summit at Gleneagles. Then a young Labour MP is killed after falling from the ramparts of Edinburgh Castle, and Rebus has another foe to contend with: Commander Steelforth of Special Branch, whose English accent is enough to rub Rebus up the wrong way even without his officious and obstructive manner. Despite the fact that this is the 16th Rebus novel, Rankin himself is far from coasting. He has taken a momentous few days in recent British history (not just the G8 and the protests, but also the success of the Olympic bid followed a day later by the London bombings) and effortlessly interwoven the political and the criminal. The novel’s title, which refers to the recitation of the names of those who have died in the Iraq war, becomes synonymous with police work when DS Siobhan Clarke, Rebus’ sidekick, reflects that naming the dead is what the CID does every day. Although Rebus, the drinking, smoking, cynical maverick, has always been a little too close to cliché for comfort, the ingenuity of Rankin’s plotting carries the narrative along superbly. With his hero so near to retirement, however, there won’t be many more additions to this excellent series (the last Rebus is due next month). The job, after all, defines the detective: “Without the job, he almost ceased to exist”.

THE NAMING OF THE DEAD by Ian Rankin
(Orion £6.99)
Buy the book here at the offer price of £6.64 (inc p&p)

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