Tartan Noir

I’m writing about novels again, this time about a group of splendid Scottish novelists (yes, yes, they all write short stories too) whose work is collectively known as Tartan Noir. Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, and Denise Mina are the three best known to Americans. I could focus on the women, who include Lin Anderson, Alanna Knight, and Alex Gray, self-titled Femmes Fatales. Anderson and Gray are co-founders of Bloody Scotland, Scotland's leading international crime writing festival. But today I’d like to share my enthusiasm for two terrific male authors: Christopher aka Chris Brookmyre, who’s long been one of my favorites, and Doug Johnstone, whose work I discovered by chance (in fact, while reading the Acknowledgments in Val McDermid’s latest Karen Pirie book) last year.

Both Brookmyre and Johnstone are Scottish to the core. Brookmyre is a satirist and master of humor who’s often been compared to Carl Hiaasen. His earlier novels rant a bit about Scottish politics, which may baffle or bore the American reader, but as his work comes into its full power, he brings ample compassion as well as keen observation to his characters, giving them wit and emotional intelligence, and brilliant plotting to his stories. Johnstone brings to his fiction an eclectic background as a nuclear physicist and rock drummer that adds breadth and depth to the crime and mayhem. Besides dealing with their lives, their relationships, and the extraordinary situations they’re thrust into, his characters reflect on the meaning of the universe and the fragility of human life and planet Earth.

My highest recommendations for Christopher Brookmyre go to the three final novels in the Jack Parlabane series, not counting “Easter eggs” that appear in some of his later books. The Parlabane books really function as standalones, because Jack’s life changes so much from book to book.

Dead Girl Walking Jack’s career as a journalist has just been destroyed by a scandal when he’s asked to find a young rock superstar who’s gone missing. An immersive plunge into the world of sex, drugs, and rock & roll and a nuanced blend of character and mounting suspense.

Black Widow One of the twistiest psychological suspense novels you’ll ever read. Jack investigates the death of the husband of surgeon Diana, who’s been doxed on the Internet in revenge for her blog about sexism in medicine. I defy the most skeptical, after reading Diana’s voice, to say a man can’t write a feminist woman authentically. But is Diana the victim, or is something else going on?

The Last Hack (Want You Gone in UK) Jack teams up with a young hacker whose mother is in prison, leaving her the sole support of a sister with Down's. Hacking, social engineering, twists and turns wrapped up in surprising bonds between unusual people and the empathy that cushions Brookmyre's razor-sharp satire and diamond-hard brilliance.

Doug Johnstone's The Skelfs is so far a six-book series set in Edinburgh about a three-generation family of women who combine two occupations: funerals and private investigation. The first is A Dark Matter. Dorothy, the matriarch, plays drums and nurtures talent in the young. Her daughter Jenny struggles to find herself when a marriage that seemed perfect turns into a relentless fantasmagoria.  

Granddaughter Hannah, a graduate student of astrophysics, ponders the nature of the universe as well as her place in the family. Johnstone is another male writer who can speak in authentic women's voices. He also invites the reader to explore an authentic insider's Edinburgh, dark corners, glorious views, numerous cemeteries, warts and all.

In the course of the series, social, philosophical, and environmental issues get a good airing and a brisk shake along with the family drama and the ins and outs of undertaking. In the latest volume, Living Is A Problem, the Skelfs are getting into eco-friendly burials, and the investigations involve drones, Ukrainians, panpsychism, and a lot more.