fivestarread #crime #detectivefiction #dystopian #familydrama #murdermystery #mystery #smalltownfiction #thriller #suspense #scottishnoir A Winter Grave takes place in a remote village in the Scottish Highlands; one that is in the grip of an ice storm. May has, as always, created the perfect atmospheric setting for his work. So in the last few months I have done a lot of tweeting and Facebook posting about library closures, particularly in the area I grew up in. At my old school they are even talking about doing away with the librarians and I get so mad at that!

Effectively I had retired,” he says. “I had turned down future contracts from my publisher. I had been doing a book or two books a year for 20 years or more and travelling, all over Europe and all over North America.Here Oban book blogger Linda Boa gives The Press and Journal her take on May’s latest offering. She also has some questions for Peter May. It’s not just the weather that provides the chills in ‘A Winter Grave’ - this is a remote Scottish Highland village, cut off by extreme weather conditions, no means of communication, a killer that clearly knows the landscape, and uses it to his advantage, a rollercoaster of emotions for Brodie and Addie, lots of twists and turns, utter fear at times, and a completely gripping storyline. Highly recommended!

The outcome of COP26 left him dismayed. “I thought ‘these people all know what the situation is, but there are more fossil fuel lobbyists at these COP conferences than there are representatives from the developing world’. The fossil fuel industry has spent decades spreading disinformation and scepticism.But here in Scotland, a body has been found frozen in the ice near Loch Leven, that of one Charles Younger, an investigative journalist with the Scottish Herald who had been reported missing three months earlier, and Detective Inspector Cameron Brodie volunteers to travel there along with the doctor who will do the post mortem, Dr Sita Roy. The climate crisis goes down and down and down the agenda so that it barely gets a mention – and yet it is the single most important thing facing the human race.

The dead man is investigative reporter, George Younger, missing for three months after vanishing during what he claimed was a hill-walking holiday. But Younger was no hill walker, and his discovery on a mountain-top near the Highland village of Kinlochleven, is inexplicable.It is the year 2051. Warnings of climate catastrophe have been ignored, and vast areas of the planet are under water, or uninhabitably hot. A quarter of the world's population has been displaced by hunger and flooding, and immigration wars are breaking out around the globe as refugees pour into neighboring countries. This is a compelling blend of an environmental/political thriller with a puzzling mystery. There’s humour although this rightly diminishes as danger levels rise, there’s plenty of tension, excitement accompanied by a building menace and peril. There are some good plot twists that keep you hooked, the pace is fast and there are some Hollywood action movie worthy scenes which give a dystopian feel. Throughout it all there is atmosphere in abundance in the Highlands setting with cruel weather to further highlight the hazardous situations. The man had no interest in hillwalking. But he was found in a frozen grave in a difficult-to-reach spot above Kinlochleven. Murder in the mountains Peter lives in South-West France with his wife, writer Janice Hally, and in 2016 both became French by naturalisation. (Peter May) stars rounded up. Brrr! Bring out the hot chocolate and afghan and turn up the heat for this chill-inducing thriller! A Winter Grave is set in the Scotland of 2051 where the effects of climate change we've been warned about have become a reality. Many parts of the world are underwater or so hot as to be uninhabitable and the world's population is on the move.