Tag Archives: William McIlvanney

The Dark Remains by William McIlvanney and Ian Rankin

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The Dark Remains by William McIlvanney and Ian Rankin was published in 2021. William McIlvanney died in 2015, this book features the character DC Laidlaw in his first case. The earlier books earned McIlvanney the title ‘father of Tartan Noir’, but this book was unfinished on his death so Ian Rankin completed it.

The setting is of course Glasgow, it’s 1972 and gang warfare is a way of life for some people. When the body of a tame lawyer with links to a gang is discovered in a lane behind a pub in a rival gang’s area it looks like a simple case to solve as far as DI Milligan is concerned and he has already decided the outcome of the case. The young Laidlaw is starting off his career as he continued it, being a thorn in the flesh of whomever happens to be his boss. The investigation takes place over six days.

I believe that the manuscript was discovered by McIlvanney’s wife after he had died and it was only half completed, so Rankin wrote on from midway. I read the original Laidlaw books way back in the 1970s when they were first published but haven’t read them since then. I enjoyed the atmosphere of 1970s Glasgow, I was a teenager back then and Glasgow was my destination a couple of times every week, but I wasn’t completely grabbed by the plot of this book and it’s very male-heavy character wise, but I suppose that is very true to the times, the females are wives or girlfriends. Thank goodness nowadays we can have Siobhans!

Lord Edgware Dies by Agatha Christie / and William McIlvanney

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I went straight from reading Blyton’s Famous Five books to Agatha Christie and it is decades and decades since I read any of her mysteries (apart from a slim volume called Black Coffee which was originally a play and was worked up into a book by Charles Osborne.)

I’ve seen quite a few people have been reading Christie so when I saw this one in my library I thought I would give it a go and see if I still found her work to be enjoyable. It was quite a surprise to me that I did enjoy this one as I had read a few snidey newspaper articles, basically saying her books were only for those of little intelligence and even smaller vocabulary. I had seen a version of this book dramatised for TV but I think it was quite different from the book. You’ve probably seen it too but the book is still worth reading. It’s a Poirot and Hastings book, the tale being told by Hastings and of course Inspector Japp pops up too, but his character is somewhat less chummy and amusing than the Japp of TV fame.

I thought that crime fiction fans might be interested to read the William McIlvanney article which appeared in today’s Guardian. I loved his books when they were first published in the 1970s. He managed to capture the atmosphere of Glasgow in print, which is more than can be said of Denise Mina whose books are set in Glasgow but are completely devoid of any Glaswegian class, gallusness and banter, something which I find unforgivable as a Glaswegian myself. McIlvanney is apparently the forgotten man of Tartan Noir, what a shame. He inspired Ian Rankin to write his Rebus series, transferring the setting to Edinburgh, the city which he has experience of.