Final thoughts on Knots and Crosses

So, I finished the first Ian Rankin Inspector Rebus novel. I was thinking it was adapted at some point by the BBC. Close, it was ITV. I knew Rankin was mad popular in the UK but evidently his books account for 10% of all crime book sales in the UK (is crime book the same as mystery? This statistic seems a bit dodgy.)

I liked several things about the book, including the way multiple protagonist viewpoints are woven together. Rebus is getting hand-delivered anonymous letters with bits of knots and matchstick crosses in them at the same time that there is a serial killer on the loose in Edinburgh who abducts and kills young girls. He finally tells his sort of girlfriend (and policewoman who outranks him-nice touch) Gill who wonders if he is sending them to himself. Meanwhile, his stage hypnotist brother is making money on the side as a drug courier and a local crime beat reporter is onto the story and convinced Detective Sergeant Rebus is involved too. And then there's the matter of Rebus' history with the SAS and some sort of secret elite training disasater that he can't recall which caused him to have a nervous breakdown. I like how the book incorporates the POV of the girlfriend, the brother, Rebus' daughter, the reporter and Rebus' two partners. It muddies the story to keep you from guessing anything and Rankin's writing is good enough that all of it compelling.

What I didn't like is I suppose Rankin is trying to show that Rebus is on the verge of cracking up again. This leads to a few confusing scenes like his first time in the sack with Gill. What happened? He couldn't get it up? I really don't know. Also, in the last third Rebus regains his memory and realizes who is behind the notes-once Gill convinces him they are related to the case-and the abductions turn personal. Rebus runs out into the city to find the killer (connected to the fucked up SAS event Rebus couldn't remember) and....stops into a pub to drink whiskey and bullshit with the clientele. Really? A child killer with a personal grudge against you has kidnapped your daughter and you decide in the middle of your search to do some shots and buy rounds? This scene as a standalone was fine but was so out of place it kind of shit all over my suspension of disbelief. It felt stapled in from earlier in the book, where it belongs.

I did like how Rankin ended the book on a minor character's fate. What happened to Rebus? Well obviously he lived since he's in 16 more books. Kind of a bold choice. I also liked learning about Edinburgh. I hadn't read anything based there so I got to do some reading on it. Edinburgh and Glasgow are only 42 miles apart. I didn't realize they were so close. Edinburgh fancies itself the culture capital of Scotland and the people there seem especially outraged that crime would be taking place. I gather they expect that kind of thing to occur in Glasgow, not the capital. I've read a few books now set in Scotland during the 80's and it seemed like a pretty dismal place economically then. I hope things have improved. It doesn't make the economic collapse news the way Ireland, Spain and Greece does at any rate.