Showing results by narrator "David Monteath" in All Categories

After wrangling with his conscience, a priest approaches Edinburgh police and reports that a man confessed to killing a young woman. During a passionate petting session with the girl, he flipped and strangled her. Following a hunch that the victim could be a missing Canadian tourist, DI Jack Knox scrambles his team to track him down. Yet their only lead is the confession, and they have little other information to go on.

All Sergeant Hamish Macbeth ever wants is a quiet life in the tranquil surroundings of Lochdubh, his home village in the Scottish Highlands. Although the area he polices is vast, he's happiest when he's working alone, yet the police authorities insist he has an assistant. In the past, they have supplied a variety of problematic misfits, but they surpass themselves with their latest effort - an American named James Bland.

Recovering addict Tommy Jarret has rented a chalet to check out reports of a sea monster near the village of Drim. Then he turns up dead, apparently from a drug overdose, and constable Hamish Macbeth finds the lad's demise particularly fishy. Deciding to go undercover, Hamish infiltrates the local drug dealing trade. But his plans looks doomed when he's teamed up with a tough Glaswegian detective inspector named Olivia Chater, aka Concrete Knickers. For the Lochdubh lawman it would be equally dangerous to flounder...or fall in love.

When Sergeant Hamish Macbeth is sent to investigate reports that the wealthy new laird of the remote Naglar House has disappeared, Scotland is hit by the worst storm in living memory. The road is washed away, phone lines are down, mobile reception is dead and his police radio is out of order. He is trapped with the laird's high-class house guests. Then he discovers the laird's body. Forced to remain overnight at the house, he interviews each of the guests and pieces together an alarming picture of clandestine infidelity, vicious jealousy, deadly revenge, lust, greed and fear.

As a young boy, Malcolm Alexander knew exactly what, and who, he wanted to be. He dreamed of becoming a doctor; he was mesmerised by the process of illness and obsessed with preventing it. He wanted to help others. In his 40s, Malcolm gave up his job in suburban Glasgow when a persistent seed that had been growing inside him started to bloom, disrupting the foundations of his life. When he saw the job advert, 'urgent: island doctor needed', he applied immediately. What he didn't anticipate was how much Orkney would affect his family, for better or worse.

The third gripping instalment in a dystopian thriller series, where modern-day recruits compete in a fight to the death in the streets of Edinburgh. Live by the rules. Die by the rules. Or break them and take your chances in the chaos that follows... The Pantheon Games are the biggest underground event in the world, with millions watching online as modern-day recruits battle to the death with weapons of the ancient world. Tyler Maitland left his life behind to search for his sister, who disappeared after joining the Pantheon's Edinburgh chapter.

The second in an action-packed adventure thriller series, where modern-day recruits compete in an ancient fight to the death in the streets of Edinburgh. New Season. New Rules. Same deadly game... The Pantheon Games are the biggest underground event in the world, followed by millions online. New recruits must leave behind their twenty-first-century lives and vie for dominance in a gruelling battle to the death armed only with ancient weapons – and their wits.

Morag Merrilea is working at the Shopmark Fashions factory during her summer holidays to earn some extra cash. But when the art student complains to Hamish about the theft of her sketchbook in the pub, he doesn't take her too seriously. After all, she had been drinking and can't quite remember what happened... and then turns out to be snippy when Hamish questions her further. But then her body is discovered - and Hamish is forced to investigate a crime where the only witness has been murdered.

It’s springtime in the Highlands but storms are brewing for Hamish Macbeth. His life is going to pot. He has - horrors! - been promoted, his new boss is a dunce, and a sinister self-proclaimed gypsy and his girlfriend have parked their rusty eyesore of a van in the middle of the village. Hamish smells trouble and as usual he’s right. The doctor’s drugs have gone missing. Money vanishes.

A missing person report is not usually something that Hamish Macbeth sees as cause for undue distress. Should a child or a vulnerable person vanish, it's an urgent matter that needs to be treated seriously, but in Macbeth's experience, most other people who go missing tend to turn up again before long. So when Kate Hibbert disappears after having last been seen struggling along the road with a heavy suitcase, he is convinced she has gone travelling and reluctantly goes through the motions of investigating.

Amazing news is spreading like wildfire across the Scottish countryside: the most famous of all Lochdubh, remotely nestling in the Highlands, is perfectly anonymous... until well-known TV reporter Crystal French races into town in her bright new BMW. And PC Hamish Macbeth, dourly wed to duty rather than the fiancée who dumped him, promptly gives her a ticket for reckless driving. Outraged, Crystal makes Macbeth's life a misery with a TV report on policing in the Highlands...

Think you know the person you’re married to? Think again. The Glasgow Fair weekend was usually the busiest of the year for the Serious Crime Division. But by the Sunday morning, it appeared to have gone off without a major hitch. Then DCI Dani Bevan received a call from one of her team. A middle-aged man had gone missing from his home in Giffnock. Dani didn’t take the case too seriously, until it turned out that the uncle of her friend, DC Andy Calder, disappeared under identical circumstances a decade before.

When a three-year old girl is reported missing, DCI Andy Gilchrist is assigned the case. But Gilchrist soon suspects that the child's mother - Andrea Davis - may be responsible for her daughter's disappearance or, worse, her murder. The case becomes politically sensitive when Gilchrist learns that Andrea is the daughter of Dougal Davis, a former MSP who was forced to resign from Scottish Parliament after being accused of physically abusing his third wife.

A short story from the British Library Crime Classic collection Final Acts. Anthony Wynne's series detective Dr Eustace Hailey becomes involved in the affairs of Lord and Lady Rushmore, the dancer Lalette Yorke, and their acquaintance Michael Dale, as lies and secrets escalate to a life-threatening climax.

The unconventional Hamish Macbeth finds that his own impetuousness places him at the center of a murder investigation. Everyone in the Scottish Highlands village of Lochdubh called Randy Duggan 'the Macho Man'. Duggan went around the village and bragged about everything he had done and said he once was a wrestler in America and an explorer in the Middle East. At first his outrageous stories drew an admiring crowd at the local pub, but soon his bullying ways lead to anger and violence.

A short story from the British Library Crime Classic collection The Edinburgh Mystery. Set in the Scottish border country, this short story sees Scotland Yard detective MacIver recall a case that he investigated in the early days of his career – the murder of Sir Henry Ellison-Stewart.

Glaswegian author Bill Knox brings us a chilling story of kidnap and revenge in The Alibi Man. Manny Davis is being held prisoner in a cellar with no recollection of how he got there, whilst parcel bombs and other strange things have been happening around the city linked to a man matching Manny’s description.

A Thief and a Hero tells the extraordinary story of Gentle Johnny Ramensky: the son of Lithuanian immigrant parents who went on to become a household name as the foremost safe-blower in the country. His daring escapes from prison would further endear him to the public and eventually bring him to the attention of the British army. When the Second World War broke, he was hand-picked to join the Commandos and rechristened himself Ramsay.

Local police stations all over the Scottish Highlands are being threatened with closure and this presents the perfect opportunity for Detective Chief Inspector Blair, who would love nothing more than to get rid of Sergeant Hamish Macbeth. Blair suggests that Cyril Sessions, a keen young police officer, visit the town of Lochdubh to monitor exactly what Hamish does every day.

Accounts of the Second World War usually involve tales of bravery in battle, or stoicism on the home front, as the British public stood together against Fascism. However, the war looks very different when seen through the eyes of the 60,000 conscientious objectors who refused to take up arms and whose stories, unlike those of the First World War, have been almost entirely forgotten.