Picking up a new Rebus book is like meeting with an old friend who you haven’t seen for a while but with whom you are instantly comfortable and in whose company you are completely certain that life is going to be anything but dull. In Even Dogs in the Wild, Ian Rankin’s 21st in the series, the Edinburgh detective has finally retired, and it’s appropriate that we first make contact with Rebus in Edinburgh’s Oxford Bar, his favourite watering hole.
His friend, and former colleague Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke (Shiv) is investigating the high-profile murder of a senior barrister, formerly Scotland’s top law officer, who was shot with a cryptic threatening note found nearby. Clarke is a bend-don’t break-the rules pragmatist who knows how to operate in the highly political Police Scotland bureaucracy.