Scottish Police Procedurals

A phone call from Belfast shatters Isobel McKenzie’s sleep and her peace. Her nephew, Jack, is safe but two of his friends from Queen’s University are not. Michael is dead and Charlene is in a coma. Isobel leaves for Belfast immediately. The PSNI suspect theft as the motive for the crime but, as Isobel and Jack investigate, they uncover other possible motives: an online bully, a drug connection and ultimately a web of organised crime. A cross-border drug task force is set up and, amidst politics and talk of corruption, the case becomes more and more complicated. Help arrives from London...

When silence falls, who will hear their cries? The body of a young girl is found dumped on the roadside on the outskirts of Edinburgh. When pathologists examine the remains, they make a gruesome discovery: the outline of a doll carved into the victim’s skin. DCI Ava Turner and DI Luc Callanach are struggling to find leads in the case until a doll made of skin is found nestled beside an abandoned baby. After another young woman is found butchered, Luc and Ava realise the babydoll killer is playing a horrifying game. And it’s only a matter of time before he strikes again.

'I read it all day and half of the night. Couldn’t put it down!' - Amazon reader DI Frank Stewart's little cold-case unit has been a bit short of work, so when a hopeless three-year old murder comes their way he's no choice but to be grateful. The unidentified body had been shot in the chest and buried on Salisbury Plain, suggesting a military connection, but Frank isn't so sure. Meanwhile failed barrister turned private eye Maggie Bainbridge and her handsome sidekick Jimmy Stewart are called in to referee a vicious sibling battle over the rights to a lucrative reality show format. Before...

When detectives John Stone and Carmen Dehan who run the Cold Cases Department at the 43rd Precinct in the Bronx choose their honeymoon together, there are three things they are very clear on: there must be good steak and whisky, it must be remote, and for two blissful weeks they must forget about work, about cold cases and about murder.

Who will be next? When the body of a local talent show winner is discovered on the eve of headlining Kilwinnoch’s annual Civic Week celebrations, it throws the festivities into chaos, and threatens to tear the close-knit community apart.

In Scotland, the Gandiegow quilters are in an uproar when their favorite fictional quilters - the Buttermilk Guild - are killed off by a best-selling mystery author. Diana McKellen is called in by the publisher to fix this PR nightmare. It's said, there's no such thing as bad publicity, but Diana questions this long-standing notion when an editor is murdered at a book signing.

In the shadow of the Pentland Hills, a man has been callously struck down in front of his home. Tyre marks suggest it was no accidental hit-and-run. Somebody wanted him dead and as the man fights for every breath, they might still get their wish. Grappling with the demons he thought he could leave behind after months away on enforced leave, D.S. Malkie McCulloch resists pressure from his superiors to pass the case on to the road policing unit, convinced that whoever was behind the wheel will be waiting for the chance to finish the job.

After a young man's body is discovered by a newlywed couple inside an abandoned caravan, the police initially speculate whether his death was accidental. However, the investigation takes a dramatic turn when they uncover the victim's true identity. The deceased has a deadly past, and barely paid the price for the heinous crime he committed. DCI Harry McNeil is assigned the task of identifying the victim’s killer, but the case soon becomes shrouded in secrecy. The man's past is far more complex than anyone had anticipated.

On a small island off the coast of Scotland, an isolated community is grieving. Eighteen-year-old Alan Ferguson was found at the foot of the lighthouse—an apparent suicide. DIs Georgina Lennox and Richard Stewart are sent to investigate. A raging storm keeps them trapped on the island for four days. And the locals don't take kindly to mainlanders. As George and Ritchie question the island's inhabitants, they discover a village filled with superstition and shrouded in secrets. But someone wants those secrets to stay buried. At any cost.

The head of Scotland’s most powerful crime family is brutally murdered, his body dumped inside an ancient grave in a remote cemetery. DS Max Craigie and DC Janie Calder arrive at the scene, a small town where everyone has secrets to hide. They soon realise this murder is part of a blood feud between two Scottish families that stretches back to the 1800s. One thing’s for certain: it might be the latest killing, but it won’t be the last.

A lawyer is found dead at sunrise on a lonely clifftop at Dunnet Head on the northernmost tip of Scotland. It was supposed to be his honeymoon, but now his wife will never see him again. The case is linked to several mysterious deaths, including the murder of the lawyer’s last client—Scotland’s most notorious criminal...who had just walked free. DS Max Craigie knows this can only mean one thing: they have a vigilante serial killer on their hands.

Is evil in the blood? When DS Andy Calder busts a small-time pornography operation in south Glasgow, he suspects they’ve only touched the tip of the iceberg. With the Serious Crime Division desperately understaffed, DCI Dani Bevan brings in a fresh member of the team. The new recruit arrives just in time. A man is found murdered in an outhouse used to produce illicit material and the grisly body-count slowly starts to rise. The 9th instalment of the DCI Dani Bevan detective series follows two complex and distinct cases, each of which call on the team to question the origins of evil itself.

After his twin brother's imprisonment for murder, DI Fraser Brodie has devoted his life to catching the very worst criminals of the Hebrides. When a local mechanic is found dead and mutilated, Brodie is on the search for a murderer. But then more bodies start turning up, and it doesn't take long for Brodie to conclude he has a serial killer on his hands. The investigation isn't proving so easy to crack, and when he discovers the missing link between the victims has connections to his own past, the race is on to find the culprit before more damage is done...

Stephen Berry is about to jump off a bridge until a suicide prevention counsellor stops him. A week later, Stephen is dead. Found at the bottom of a cliff, DI Luc Callanach and DCI Ava Turner are drafted in to investigate whether he jumped or whether he was pushed.... As they dig deeper, more would-be suicides roll in: a woman found dead in a bath; a man violently electrocuted. But these are carefully curated deaths – nothing like the impulsive suicide attempts they’ve been made out to be.

NEW FOR 2023 – STAND-ALONE, #20 IN THE SERIES. MEET MAVERICK BRITISH DETECTIVE DI SKELGILL... "A COMPELLING BRITISH CRIME MYSTERY." AN ATTEMPTED MURDER in the United States … a tragic road death in a Cumbrian forest … an old photograph stolen from an ancient coaching inn. Unrelated events – until a midnight drowning below Ouse Bridge exposes a connection. After two decades, has a killer returned to Cumbria to ply their trade? Does a suspect hide in plain sight among loose acquaintances? Who is truthful and who is lying? Skelgill must patiently circle … until finally he picks up ...

A woman is found dead, brutally murdered, her death made to look like an accident. DCI Sean Bracken is called in and discovers that the young woman has a very powerful father. Was somebody trying to get back at him, or has the woman's secrets finally caught up with her? Bracken also has to deal with the mysterious arson attack on his boss' house. And a name from the past resurfaces, a name that Bracken thought was dead and buried.

When the body of a journalist is found in a traditional Shetland boat, Detective Inspector Willow Reeves is drafted in to head up the investigation. Jimmy Perez has been out of the loop, but his local knowledge is needed, and he decides to help the inquiry. Originally a Shetlander, the journalist had left the islands years before to make a name for himself in London, leaving a scandal in his wake. He had few friends in Shetland, so why was he back?

As a prosecutor in the Scottish Highlands, Rachel is no stranger to death. But when a body is found in a local cemetery, she’s confronted by a case that hits far too close to home. The victim is connected to an investigation Rachel’s mother was involved in before her own mysterious disappearance years ago. And Rachel is seized by hope that she might finally discover the truth. Desperate for more clues, Rachel enlists the help of determined detective constable Selena MacDonald, but soon the trail runs cold.

On New Year’s Day, Shetland lies buried beneath a deep layer of snow. Trudging home, Fran Hunter's eye is drawn to a vivid splash of colour on the white ground, ravens circling above. It is the strangled body of her teenage neighbour. As Fran opens her mouth to scream, the ravens continue their deadly dance. The body is found close to the home of a lonely outcast and local suspicion falls firmly on him. But when Inspector Jimmy Perez insists on broadening the search for suspects, a veil of distrust and fear is thrown over the entire community.

A group of old university friends leave the bright lights of London, travelling to Shetland to celebrate the marriage of one of their friends to a local. But late on the night of the wedding party, one of them, Eleanor, disappears–apparently into thin air. Detectives Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves are dispatched to investigate. Before she went missing, Eleanor claimed to have seen the ghost of a local child who drowned in the 1920s. Jimmy and Willow are convinced that there is more to Eleanor’s disappearance than they first thought.