Black and Blue
Decide its fate
The record
Time
An eveningA season512 pages, about 10 hours: the length of 1.6 typical books on the shelf.
Getting in
Walk right inSteep climbRebus is exiled to Craigmillar station while an old case against him reopens.
What it gives
Plot and actionIdeas to live byIn 11 reviews from critics and book blogs, 10 credit the plot and 2 credit the ideas or a change in how they live.
One of a kind
Others do thisNothing else doesRhapsody in Books calls it almost a Pelecanos book, and Wikipedia traces its staccato style to James Ellroy.
The case for it
on the plotting
“Rankin’s dexterity in juggling plots and threats and motives lights up the darkness”
Unsigned review · Kirkus Reviews, 1997 on the book’s themes
“Rankin has a point to make about the corrosive effects of human wickedness”
Marilyn Stasio · The New York Times Book Review, 1997 on the sense of place
“The book’s other chief virtue is its sense of place.”
a book blog on the plot strands
“Rankin somehow manages to keep all these plates spinning in a really superior entry”
a book blog
The case against
on the pacing
“fascinating and engaging for a couple of chapters, only to fall completely dead and dull”
a book blog on the sub-plots
“there were so many sub-plots that sometimes it was hard to keep them all straight.”
a book blog on the drug gangs
“I really don’t like spending time with drug gangs”
a book blog on the style
“Stylistically, too, Rankin seems less assured than usual.”
Liam McIlvanney · Times Literary Supplement, 1997
