STAR READ: New top cop's life is dialled up to chaotic in Inverness writer JD Kirk's latest crime novel
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
The incredible rate of writer JD Kirk’s Inverness crime novels featuring DCI Jack Logan let up long enough earlier this year to introduce a new investigator to the world – the vaguely familiar DI Heather Filson (originally Logan series).
She and The One That Got Away (Zertex, £9.99) – the book that introduces her as a main character of her own, were discussed by JD Kirk, better-known as Barry Hutchison, at the Nairn Book & Arts Festival today.
After you put life on hold to race to the end of the heart-thumping chase to find a missing schoolgirl, you can’t help feeling close to the flawed, fallen Kilmarnock detective Heather Filson. Though you might not want to get TOO close... Smelly socks, greasy hair, there seems little chance for time-wasting personal hygiene.
But juggling caring for a dad with dementia, a fast-developing case and maybe the reappearance of an elusive serial killer from the past, it all keeps Heather’s life dialled up to chaotic.
Yes, we see her callously winding up a teacher interested in her, but as the trauma in her own past emerges, the total picture means it’s hard not to warm to her. The writer even creates a poetic interlude in the snow to show a gentler side to his new feisty heroine: “The snow ... streaked past the street lights like tiny white comets, existing for just that fleeting moment ... she gazed up into it for a while. It made her feel like she was on the deck of some spaceship zooming through space, stars sliding by on either side...”
But will you love her more than junior sidekick ‘Nancy Drew’, as Heather calls the inspired creation that is Ace?
Who knows. And if JD has a few weeks spare, would he give HER her own series?!
Crime fans should love JD Kirk touches like “The William McIlvanney Campus”.
The One That Got Away by JD Kirk (Zertex, £9.99) who will also guest at St Duthac Book & Arts Festival on September 14.
