Most helpful customer reviews
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5.0 out of 5 stars
VickySaysHi - Rebus Forever!, Aug 8 2004
Atmosphere, deep characterization, real emotions, solid clever plotting - what more could one want in a mystery? Rankin again satisfies in every area. If you aren't yet a fan, start with Knots and Crosses and join the millions who wait impatiently for each new installment of this series.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
As Determined As Ever, Jan 30 2004
This is the 14th book in the Inspector John Rebus series (not counting the book of short stories) and once again Rebus is hard at work intimidating criminals and annoying his superiors. This book is a little unusual because Rebus works pretty closely with a couple of partners, something he has steered clear from with almost pathological alacrity up until now. It felt as though the whole tone of the book was much lighter as a result, particularly when dealing with his emotional state.The book opens with Rebus in hospital nursing two very badly scalded hands. Apart from raising the question as to how he came to scald his hands, which remains a secret for the majority of the book, it also makes him dependent on others for just about every simple function, such as the important ones like drinking a beer or lighting a cigarette to driving a car. The result is some interesting working interactions between Rebus and his fellow detectives which makes a very refreshing change. Soon after leaving hospital, Rebus is called in to assist on what appears to be a tragic but straightforward schoolyard murder / suicide shooting. His experience is requested because the murderer is an ex-SAS soldier, a branch of the army that Rebus had trained with before quitting and joining the police. The idea is that Rebus might be able to add some unique insights due to this previous experience, but it also opens the door to a look at John's own past and a part of it that we the reader have rarely been able to look at. It was nice to finally get a bit of an insight into his life before the police, which was always mentioned in passing, but never expanded on satisfactorily. And even when it was put under the microscope here, Rebus still kept things pretty close to his chest, whetting my appetite for more in a later book, perhaps. The investigation and consequently the story, moves along at a fast pace, particularly for a police procedural style of book. This is a common theme with the Rebus stories, thanks to his sheer determination to solve the crime. He is always more intent on advancing the investigation rather than being content to sit around airing conjecture after conjecture. The prose is strong on characterisation with plenty of background information given on each of the main characters making it very easy to understand the motives behind their actions. But as with just about all of the Rebus books, the greatest "character" description is reserved for the city of Edinburgh and its surrounds. You really get a terrific feeling of place thanks to the detail that Ian Rankin goes into when moving through the city. If you've never read an Inspector Rebus book before and came across this one, you would be inclined to think that here was an untroubled policeman who is very proficient at his job. In actual fact, during the course of the previous 13 books, he has battled through a failed marriage, chronic insomnia, alcoholism and thoughts of suicide. Finally he appears to have arrived at a place where he is much more comfortable with himself. In the past he was a loner on the job, preferring to keep his thoughts and his theories to himself, much to his fellow detectives' frustration and his superior's total annoyance. It looks as though this attitude has changed and I think it's a change for the better. I was actually concerned for his health in the earlier books. Additionally, if you haven't read the earlier Inspector Rebus books, you'd have no problem starting off with this book. There are no fears of coming across plot pieces that could act as spoilers of earlier books and the characters are introduced in such a way that you don't need any prior knowledge of them to appreciate where they fit in Rebus' life. I'm sure the result of starting with this book would be an overwhelming urge to go back and read the earlier books. Thanks to the extra interaction between Rebus and Siobhan Clarke, I thought this was an excellent addition to what is already an outstanding series. It's also nice to see that his dogged determination to solve the case and his disregard for his superiors hasn't diminished at all either.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
An Answer of Trust Deciet and History, Dec 11 2003
Ian Rankin's contemplative story of a tragic school shooting in a small Scottish town wrestles with the fragility of human existence. A Question of Blood gives the reader a look at a life that occurs only after death.
Often the hardest thing for a writer in the detective story genre to accomplish is to maintain a high standard of writing, as well as a completely new plot each and every time, but Ian Rankin has done this very well with his Inspector Rebus series; which he started in 1987 when he was meant to be finishing a PhD in English Literature.
Detective Inspector John Rebus is in hospital, hands heavily bandaged after he put them into a hot bath by mistake, or so he says. Visiting him is his friend and colleague DC Siobhan Clarke. She's telling him all about the shooting that occurred in a private school just North of Edinburgh. A man named Lee Herdman walked into a common room shooting three kids, leaving two dead and one injured, after which he turned the weapon on himself. But that is not the only news; Martin Fairstone, the man who had taken to stalking and harassing Siobhan, has been found burnt to death in his own home under suspicious circumstances. Rebus' bandaged hands don't look too good for him, especially since he was seen leaving the house shortly before it went up in flames.
Once out of hospital Rebus is assigned the task of finding Lee Herdman's motive. It doesn't take him long before he discovers that his cousin lost his son on that day and he is reunited with a sense of family that has been dead a long time. However all is not well as old memories haunt his relationship with his cousin. Rebus must evaluate himself and he is scared by what he finds. He sees shocking similarities between himself and the killer and this gives the story a much deeper level of intensity.
"There is no mystery, ... except for the why". But the why turns into a bigger mystery every day. Often following hunches and 'wild stabs in the dark', Rebus progresses slowly. He is left with pieces of the puzzle that he is not sure fit. As he says: everything is potentially useful. His investigation takes him to an insane asylum where Herdman was a regular visitor of a man named Robert Niles who is also ex-army. There he finds a name of man who also visited Niles. His name is Doug Brimson and was also a friend of Herdman. Brimson runs an airstrip where he offers flying lessons. This comes in useful when Rebus needs to get to an island called Jura, where Herdman was sent on a salvage operation while in the army. All the information Rebus gets doesn't seem to have any relevance when first uncovered. Through Rankin's genius however, everything comes together in the end.
Ian Rankin's characters were really well developed, showing many sides to the main characters. If the characters are not believable then the story cannot be believable. However, A Question of Blood is not only believable, it is real. In fact, Rebus could walk into a room and have a discussion with you, and you probably won't learn much more about him than you could reading the book (except perhaps for his thoughts on the day's weather). The book allows the reader to enter the DI's thoughts and Ian Rankin does this very effectively, while being careful to keep the suspense with respect to the case, as heightened as ever. By way of entering characters' thoughts at certain times, the reader can either gain further understanding of what is happening to the plot or the character, or the author's idea's can be more clearly expressed. An example of this is when Rebus is exploring the mind-boggling complicity of how the universe works and how everything has its place in the endless sequence of events we call life. I think that Ian Rankin managed to use this method extremely effectively and that he enhanced the overall impression that the reader gets once finished A Question of Blood.
Not only were the characters developed well, but the amount of stories that are happening at once, and the way that Rankin managed to fit them all together is wonderful. As Rebus tries to find Lee Herdman's motive, not only is he being investigated; but also at one point the body of Rebus' friend (an ex-cop) is found at a set of railway tracks; and of course there are other underlying plots that unravel as the book progresses. There is not one book being read, but two novels and a couple short stories too. Ian Rankin pulls this off in style without over complicating the main plot.
A Question of Blood is a book that can be enjoyed by anyone who is willing and able to read. Although a long book, the vocabulary used is not too complicated and could be understood by most eleven or twelve year olds. I would recommend this novel however, to those who enjoy denser books as the first half or so is slow going because of the absolute volume of thoughts being thrown at the reader. Slow going maybe, but still an interesting and rewarding read.
Ian Rankin has succeeded in writing a novel that not only tells an enthralling story but also challenges the reader to think more deeply than he/she might on a regular basis. Similarly to DI Rebus, the reader is asked to look inside himself/herself and think about where they stand on the issues presented in this novel.
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