THE QUESTION OF BLOOD is the fourteenth novel featuring Inspector John Rebus. Rebus is an Edinburgh police man with a sense of isolated honor. Mainly alone, prone to drink, bad at department politics, he is good police. It is the sole sum of his identity. Rather than getting stale with the predictability of character, the series remains new with a continuing evolution of one man’s humanity. QUESTION OF BLOOD opens with Rebus in hospital, hands badly burned and freshly bandaged. Is it possible he’s done something horrific? Detective Siobhan Clarke’s stalker lies dead. Fire. As Rebus tries to solve this mystery and avoid giving the higher ups an excuse to sack him it begins to look damning for our hero. Salvation comes with a phone call. An old friend asks Rebus to help with the investigation of a school shooting. With his singular talent Rankin weaves these stories and dissects them at the same time. A QUESTION OF BLOOD is a story of relationships. The horrific, the wonderful, and those determined by unthinking actions with grave consequences. Rebus plods on through this book, sifting through clues and his own past. He must look for sense in a set of circumstances where no sense can be made. QUESTION OF BLOOD is an emotional read and at the end of the book you will be spent. And of course waiting for the next installment of mystery’s most intriguing police man.

Ruth Jordan