Dual timeline novel set around the world
Thriller set in the SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS
29th December 2022
A Winter Grave by Peter May, thriller set in the Scottish Highlands.
(A note below of dates when Peter will be appearing in Scotland with A Winter Grave and where you can get tickets, including one date in London)
Following on from Cop26, the author’s intense concern about climate change grew and he was motivated to bring to very colourful and frightening life (through his writing), the consequences of inaction. As an author he has created a thrilling storyline set in 2051, when the evidence of current apathy results in terrible consequences. The world is drowning and ice storms in Winter are the norm. He pens an apocalyptic and intense picture of how the world may well look only 30 odd years hence.
You may remember that Peter May penned a thriller titled Lockdown back in the early 2000s, about a terrible virus and the effects on populations. He couldn’t then find a publisher because his prescient (as it turned out) depiction seemed just too unlikely. Coronavirus arrived and publication of his book ensued. His narrative was starkly on point, as it turns out and perhaps this is once again a prescient and graphic depiction of the future.
The year is 2051. Cameron Brodie is a veteran Glasgow detective and he is struggling with a new medical diagnosis which will take its toll. He spots a work opportunity, that will serve a purpose for him, and which takes him up to Kinlochleven. The body of a man, George Younger as it turns out, has been found by a meteorologist. He is lying precariously embedded in the ice suspended over an ice tunnel and, thus, as she glances up, she sees the horrific image looming above her.
The incredibly inclement conditions mean the body is taken down to a local hotel on the shores of Loch Leven and is temporarily housed in the hotel’s cake cooler until the pathologist and Brodie manage to brave the swirling winds and snow and land in their eVTOL (which is a sort of automated helicopter). They settle into their hotel which has the feel of being in The Shining and when it becomes clear that someone seems to be indeed prowling around, keeping tabs on them, then the sense of spookiness grows.
Part of the novel looks back at the year 2023, which sets Brodie’s current issues in an almost contemporary context.
He invents all kinds of new devices that seem perfectly plausible for 2051. Anyone who watched The Capture on BBC will understand that Peter May has simply looked into the future and extrapolated the consequences of deep fake. I am glad to report that milky coffee and cheese sandwiches are still a thing 30 years hence, but surely Patagonia needed to be the brand of choice (given their ecological and environmental credentials) rather than a down filled North Face parka (discuss! 😉). Down will be long gone, I hope, given the cruelty of its harvesting.
The author has really gone to town, in a plausible way, about the effects of ignoring the warnings about climate all around us today… ignore it at your peril is what he is clearly saying. The sense of place is terrifically graphic as the characters negotiate their trip up to and through The Highlands in terrible weather conditions.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
Now that we are well out of Lockdown and life is looking more normal, Peter is out and about with A Winter Grave and you can meet him at the following events. Tickets available on the links:
Thursday 19th January – Hatchards, London
Tuesday 24th January – Inverness
Wednesday 25th January – Perth
Thursday 26th January – Waterstones Dundee – formal signing at 12 midday – 1pm
Thursday 26th January – Toppings, St Andrews at 7.30pm – event
Friday 27th January – Toppings, Edinburgh at 7pm
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Excellent Review, Tina!
It is so difficult right now, as we all know that climate change is going to change our world forever if we don’t do something about it. However, there are so many other economic challenges which have the immediate potential for disaster and there really isn’t enough money in the coffers to tackle all the issues we might like to!
I am also personally of the opinion, that unless all the main world players, ie. China, India, Russia and the US, sign up to any climate change policies with any real enthusiasm then any difference the rest of us can make is going to be negated almost instantly. This has to be a multilateral attack!
I really thought I had read more books by this author than the one (Coffin Road) which Goodreads is flagging up. Having said that, I have also found at least six books on my physical shelves, just longing to be opened!
Another resolution for 2023 and we are only three days in 🙂