Book Log 2012 #13: Cold Granite by Stuart MacBride

Logan MacRae is just back to work after a year off recovering (and perhaps not fully) from stab wounds suffered in solving a serial murder case, and finds himself in the middle of a string of child murders and disappearances. He's got to juggle the investigations with the press (and the inevitable leak), an ME who is hostile towards him, and a changed landscape among the brass. All of this takes place within the bleak backdrop of Aberdeen, where it seems to rain every day it doesn't snow.

I have to say I enjoyed this book very much, both straight-up as a crime novel and for the elements more specific to Tartan noir. Aberdeen is used to great effect, and the apology to the tourist board that MacBride puts at the start of the book was good for a laugh. I didn't find MacRae to be as anti-heroic as the genre suggests, but more of that may come out later in the series, which I intend to continue.