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Content snapshot
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Violence
Some
A disappearance and a murder investigation; procedural violence
Language
Some
Strong language
Sexual Content
None
No sexual content
Substance Use
A lot
Very heavy drinking; Rebus is operating on whisky and COPD medication
Emotional Intensity
Some
The particular difficulty of being a father when you have always been a detective first; mortality as an ongoing presence rather than a distant threat
What this book is about
Rebus's daughter Samantha calls from the far north of Scotland: her husband has gone missing. Rebus, ill and older, drives north to help her while simultaneously supporting Siobhan Clarke's investigation of a dead sheikh in Edinburgh. The parallel investigations are connected in ways that take most of the novel to reveal. Ian Rankin's twenty-fourth Rebus novel is his most explicitly family-focused — Rebus's relationship with Samantha has always been fraught, and this is the first time she has asked him for help. Written during the COVID-19 lockdown, it has a specific melancholy about isolation and illness.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
twenty-fourth of the Rebus series
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