Song of the Dead
by Douglas Lindsay
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Pub Date 24 Mar 2016 | Archive Date 30 Apr 2016
Description
From the author of The Legend of Barney Thomson, recently released as a major motion picture starring Emma Thompson, comes a dark, brooding new crime series. Police detective Ben Westphall is burnt out and leading a quiet life in the North of Scotland. Things change when he is assigned to investigate the cold case of a UK national who disappeared in Eastern Europe under mysterious circumstances and who, despite being declared dead, has re-appeared, claiming to have been held for over a decade, various body parts having been harvested during that time. Westphall travels to Estonia, chasing leads and shadows that may lead to an international drugs and organ trafficking conspiracy.
A Note From the Publisher
Some decades later he left to live in Belgium. Meeting his future wife, Kathryn, he took the opportunity to drop out of reality and join her on a Foreign & Commonwealth Office posting to Senegal. It was here that he developed the character of Barney Thomson, while sitting in an air-conditioned apartment drinking gin & tonic at eight o'clock in the morning. Since the late 1990s, he has penned seven books in the Barney series, and several other crime novels written in the non-traditional style. His first book, The Long Midnight of Barney Thomson, has been translated into several languages and will soon be released as the major motion picture event, The Legend of Barney Thomson, starring Robert Carlyle, Emma Thompson and Ray Winstone.
Advance Praise
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781910449998 |
| PRICE | US$0.00 (USD) |
Featured Reviews
Martha B, Reviewer
I really enjoyed this book. A fast pace, great plot and believable characters. I hope there is a second book in the series. It left me wanting more from the characters. Thank you Douglas Lindsay. I have reviewed on Goodreads.
Mallory Anne-Marie H, Reviewer
Review: SONG OF THE DEAD by Douglas Lindsay
(DI BEN WESTPHALL #1)
The prolific author of the Barney Thomson series and the DCI Jericho series institutes a brand-new series protagonist, burned out, worn down, DI Ben Westphall of Scotland. Sent to investigate a strange situation in Estonia, Ben may be in over his head. Years ago, two UK tourists visited Eastern Europe. The man disappeared, and shortly his corpse was pulled from a lake and identified by three people. His girlfriend dropped out of sight. Now a man has entered an Estonian police station, claiming the identity of the dead man, explaining he had been confined and subjected to organ harvesting.
Paromjit H, Reviewer
Song for the Dead oozes atmosphere, gets under your skin and settles there whilst contemplating philosophical conundrums within which a crime story resides. It is located in Aberdeen and Estonia. DI Ben Westphall, a man who has one foot in this world and the other in the world of the dead, packs a punch as a man and a investigator. He has prescient qualities and is aided by ghosts. He used to work for the security services from where he developed his fear of flying. He is going to need all his gifts to untangle a dark, murky, and dangerous trail.
It begins with Westphall travelling to Estonia the long way round to meet a man, John Baden, who is supposed to have died 12 years ag0. Baden claims to have been held captive for 12 years where body parts have been extracted from him and he has been forced to have sex with different women. Baden's reappearance triggers a number of murders in Aberdeen with connections to him. Whilst being haunted by the suicide of Dorothy, who worked at the British Embassy, Westphall finds himself encountering the illegal trade in organs, twisted deceptions and danger around every corner.
The novel is steeped with melancholy, grief and loss. Westphall emanates these qualities and communes with the dead. The weather adds its echoes to the dark content present in the story. There is consideration of how a person might exist as two people. And the notions of what is real, for example, the title of this novel is seen as a book both by Melanie Waverly and Westphall, yet it does not exist. I am reminded of the quote from Hamlet, 'To be, or not to be: that is the question: ...'.
This is an extraordinary, intelligent and off kilter read which I cannot recommend highly enough. As to the question of whether the book exists, well, Freight Books kindly gave an ARC via netgalley.
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