Hide & Seek

Ian Rankin

So, we were talking about reading a series in the correct order. I've jumped from Ian Rankin's tenth Rebus novel (which was Dead Souls) to this, Hide & Seek, his second. His daughter has grown younger and lives in London (by novel no. 10 she's back in Edinburgh and you can see why Rankin shifted her up there - Rebus's love interests have all the permanence of a Bond girl and our hero clearly needed some sort of emotional anchor). But apart from that it's much the same old Rebus. Same old Watson in charge of the station. Same old drifting from pub to pub in search of clues (or perhaps, just inspiration). And much the same crime to be solved. The solution, as per last time, is "it's the nobs what done it guv". OK, there's a dead junkie, some witchcraft, and a spot of illegal dog-fighting on the way but in the end it's the great and the good of Edinburgh who get fingered by Rebus. But then, after all, rotten toffs make for the best plots. They're the ones with the furthest to fall and the money to cover it up when things go wrong. Another holiday read. Entertaining.