Stuart Macbride: Partners in Crime

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I wanted a break from LAPD, NYPD, FBI, CIA etc. These amusing short stories about Aberdeen's finest police, DI Roberta Steel and DS Logan McRae are about as far away from most US police thrillers as an iceberg from a tropical island. I read these stories as an introduction to Macbride's very successful Logan Macrae series - and I wasn't disappointed.

These 2 short stories are full of dark humour that made me laugh out loud several times. In the first story DI Steel is in a very bad pre-Christmas mood, especially when she has to interrupt her last minute shopping to investigate a missing person, and finds out she has been left a fairly large legacy by a despicable criminal - as long as she gives him a glowing eulogy at his funeral. She takes out her anger at DC Allan by making him wear a flashing Santa cap to the interview with the stressed-out wife.

The next story has just as much dark humour when a large group of diverse criminals (including violent ex IRA and a supposedly dead criminal) converge on a small, remote Scottish island to rescue a huge delivery of heroin that sunk with a yacht near the island. Both DI Steel and DS McRae are involved in this and what should have been easy catch goes badly wrong.

I enjoyed Macbride's writing, the humour, and the Scottish setting and angles and look forward to reading more of the Logan Macrae series. WARNING: 40% of this very short book is a promotional extract from Macbride's next book "Close to the Bone".