[.ca] The Naming of the Dead (ISBN 159483878X)

One of the year's best:
Anyone who likes Michael Connelly's Harry Borsch series should like Ian Rankin's Rebus series as well. This was the first Ian Rankin book I read. After completing it, I had to go out and buy all the earlier books in Rankin's "Rebus series". I am now in the middle of catching up on John Rebus's life. However, "The Naming of the Dead" is a good book to start with, even if you haven't read the others in the series.

A master of his genre at the top of his game:
The Naming of the Dead is the lastest in a series of mystery novels by the great Scottish writer Ian Rankin. Rankin has once again returned to his tortured antihero Inspector Rebus. As always, Rebus is tilting at his own personal windmills, trying to get the better of his superior officers and trying to stay clear of his nemesis Ger Cafferty. Rankin's writing is taut and the murder plot moves along at a good clip. But it is the character of Rebus that makes Rankin's novels so compelling. It seems that his mantle of guilt and responsibility becomes heavier to bear with each book. Rankin's other recurring character Siobhan Clarke is also a great character study and with this novel she is moving perilously close to leading the kind of austere and driven life that Rebus endures with so much difficulty. Rankin is a real master of his genre and here he is at the top of his game.