Two years ago, on Midsummer’s Day, on the banks of Loch Lomond, a young girl died – presumably by accident. The following year, as the families re-unite, the three boys head out in a canoe to an island with one Warren McAvoy. Only one returns – McAvoy killed the other two and then vanished without trace. Until almost exactly one year later…

Five days before Midsummer’s Day, DCI Anderson’s investigation of the murder of an old woman, burned to death inside her own home, is interrupted by the discovery of another body. McAvoy has been found at last – but the person who found him tied his arms to a pair of horses and… well, let’s say the horses are made to run in opposite directions and I’ll leave the rest to the imagination.

As Midsummer’s Day approaches, the death toll begins to mount. Someone is out for revenge – but against who?

This is the sixth book in the Anderson & Costello series from Caro Ramsay – I’m new to the series myself but on the strength of this, I’m very tempted to return in the future. This copy was provided by Severn House for me to review.

It’s a fast moving novel, probably more of a thriller than a fairly clued mystery – which, to be fair, is the description on the cover and it had me gripped from start to finish. The murderer certainly doesn’t hang around, with a pretty high body count when all is said and done, and it kept my attention throughout – one of those books that I found myself carrying around to keep reading as much as possible.

There are gripes – I found Costello a bit of an enigma as a new reader (I don’t think her forename is ever mentioned), and some of the ongoing plots would have had more impact with me if I’d read the rest of the series. And some of the killer’s behaviour (and victims) seems to boil down to the fact that they’re, well, mad. Oh, and one aspect of the mystery won’t surprise any experienced reader of crime novels.

But despite all of those moans, I really enjoyed this book. It’s a fast-paced exciting crime novel that twists and turns all over the place, building to a thrilling emotional climax.

Definitely Well Worth A Look, and I’ll be dipping into the earlier entries in the series at some point in the future.