Penguin | 2018 (31 May) | 448p | Review copy | Buy the book
When Inspector Frey receives a visit in the Edinburgh police headquarters by Miss Millie Fletcher, the housekeeper of the wealthy Kolomon family who live in the Highlands, he realises that she brings with her a mystery that he and his colleague Inspector Nine-Nails McGray will not be able to turn down. Millie tells him that Benjamin, the illegitimate child she had to give away years before, is being brought back into the Kolomon family home as heir to his recently deceased father’s estate. It seems that Benjamin’s father was the brother of Mr Kolomon and he and his wife now wish to make peace with the past.
But death threats have been made against Benjamin should he return home and Millie and the Kolomons implore the Inspectors to come to the Kolomons’ manor on the shore of Loch Maree. In return, Millie will reveal a remedy that will cure McGray’s sister of that madness that led to the loss of his finger and much more besides. Irresistible. But it is clear that danger won’t wait for Benjamin to return to the Highlands. It finds him first in Orkney, where his guardian is murdered. It follows him to Loch Maree where mystery hides in the shadows of the manor and in the woods of the loch’s islands. McGray and Frey soon learn that they have walked into a living nightmare.
Loch of the Dead is the fourth novel by Oscar de Muriel to feature Frey and McGray and how good it is to spend time with these curious, ill-matched and really rather odd inspectors. This is one of my favourite Victorian crime series, if not the one I look forward to the most, and Loch of the Dead was such a joy to read from start to finish. I love the mix of Victorian detail, the Scottish setting, the intriguing crimes and the hint of something that ranges from melodramatic to supernatural. There’s only a hint of the latter and it comes with possible explanations but in this Victorian world where news travels at the pace of a telegraph, everything seems likely and anything believable. Especially in the gloriously beautiful yet menacing setting of Loch Maree. The fact that events take place in hot sunshine also adds something of the unexpected!
This is such a great story from the beginning but it’s in the second half that the novel becomes utterly unputdownable as the pace of events explodes and the creepiness levels increase and the horror of the situation facing the Inspectors stands clear before our eyes. This is compelling stuff! And I was gripped and loved how the story (and its characters – unusual to say the least) developed and the mood was maintained.
But no matter how wonderful the story, or how stunning or creepy the setting, the main reasons why this is such a successful series are the quality of Oscar de Muriel’s writing – there are some wonderfully witty moments here – and the two characters of McGray and Frey. How I love these two and here the relationship between the two is stirred up even more by Frey’s very English Uncle Maurice who plays a key role in the novel. He and McGray could be from another world, even without the tartan and the accents. There’s humour in the differences between McGray and Frey but there’s also such warmth. We know that they wouldn’t be without each other really even if each of them treats the other like an alien.
These novels always have a most curious mystery at their heart and The Loch of the Dead is no different. I love the strangeness as well as the warmth and the humour. Long may McGray and Frey continue to annoy the hell out of one another.
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