The Isle of Mull sits off the west coast of Scotland, and the ancient Dumfala Castle sits isolated on the North West corner of the island. DI Anna Vaughan is summoned away from her family Christmas – not a great loss given how annoying her mother-in-law is – to investigate a suspicious death. But this is clearly more than just a simple murder.

The castle’s owner, Robert Fairlie, is reluctant for the police to intervene, obsessed as he is with a television deal to use the castle as a set for a hit US show. But someone clearly has a grudge against Fairlie , and as death strikes again, the weather turns and Anna finds herself trapped in the community with a killer who is determined to finish what they have started.

People wonder what you need to do to for me to review a book. Well, cleverly knowing in advance where I’m going to be on my holidays and writing a murder mystery that is set in said place (well, somewhere just across the water from where I was saying) is a pretty good way to do it. Hey, it even got me to read the first in the series, The Knapdale Murders, as well.

I do rather like this series. Anna is a personable lead – I was a little disappointed that her sidekick from the previous book wasn’t involved, but Scotland is a big place. I did think that Fairlie was a tad unbelievable as to exactly how stubborn he was – basically, it felt a bit as if he was behaving like he was a character in a murder mystery.

However, this, of course, is a murder mystery, with a nice selection of suspects and more of a traditional mystery than you tend to get with police procedurals. There’s a nice sort-of locked room in the plot with a simple-but-clever solution (the best kind) and the plot is nicely complex but followable.

Admittedly, I did guess the murderer very early on, as soon as they did something, but I don’t think many people will do the same. All in all, a very satisfying read. Looking forward to what comes next.