The Black Loch by Peter May BLOG TOUR #TheBlackLoch @authorpetermay @riverrunbooks @soph_ransompr #BookExtract

 

A MURDER

The body of eighteen-year-old TV personality Caitlin is found abandoned on a remote beach at the head of An Loch Dubh - the Black Loch - on the west coast of the Isle of Lewis. A swimmer and canoeist, it is inconceivable that she could have drowned.

A SECRET

Fin Macleod left the island ten years earlier to escape its memories. When he learns that his married son Fionnlagh had been having a clandestine affair with the dead girl and is suspected of her murder, he and Marsaili return to try and clear his name.

A RECKONING

But nothing is as it seems, and the truth of the murder lies in a past that Fin would rather forget, and a tragedy at the cages of a salmon farm on East Loch Roag, where the tense climax of the story finds its resolution.

The Black Loch takes us on a journey through family ties, hidden relationships and unforgiving landscapes, where suspense, violent revenge and revelation converge in the shadow of the Black Loch.

The Black Loch by Peter May is published on 12 September 2024 by Riverrun. As part of this Blog Tour, I am delighted to share an extract from the book with you today.

Extract from The Black Loch by Peter May 

George Gunn folded his jacket and laid it carefully on the driver’s seat before swinging the door shut. It was not gone nine-thirty, and yet the morning sun was already hot. He clipped his Motorola Airwave to his belt and folded up each sleeve of his blue shirt to just a fraction below the elbow.

‘It’s going to be another hot one, George.’ Detective Constable Louise McNish appeared pleased by the prospect.

Gunn grunted and glowered at her across the roof of the car. He preferred the wind blowing in off the sea, the sting of rain in his face. All a matter, he supposed, of what you were used to. McNish, a good twenty years his junior, was a mainlander. From the soft south. Sometimes known as Glasgow. They ran for cover at the first sign of real rain there. He turned his gaze towards the shore.

From the gravel parking area above the beach he saw the black rock exposed at low tide breaking through a skin of sand, high tide delineated by the seaweed it had left behind in wavy lines. The smell of it carried on the breeze, salty and familiar. Next to a white Nissan X- Trail, the ambulance was parked almost on the sand itself, the flashing of its blue light nearly lost in the brilliance of this late August sunshine. A woman crouched at the tideline, leaning over a figure that lay prone on the gentle shelving of the sand. A uniformed police officer and two ambulance men stood watching. Death seemed particularly inappropriate on such a morning.

Gunn picked his way across the beach, Louise following in his wake, black boots leaving deep treads in soft sand. The uni- form nodded acknowledgement and stepped aside. The doctor looked up from the body. Fair hair dragged back and held out of her face by clasps. A strong face, pale, without make-up. She looked weary. ‘Just a lassie,’ she said.

Gunn let his eyes fall to the body and felt something turn over in his stomach. He knew this girl. Not personally. But her face was very familiar. A striking face, full lips that he had seen often parted in laughter. Her long silken chestnut hair lay tangled among the seaweed, blue eyes gazing up at him, almost in accusation. He knew, of course, that was just in his mind. The guilt he always felt when confronted by a death he had not been there to stop. He closed his eyes. What was her name again?

‘Caitlin Black, Detective Sergeant,’ the doctor said, as though she had overheard his thought.

Peter May is the multi award-winning author of:

- the Lewis Trilogy set in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland;

- the China Thrillers, featuring Beijing detective Li Yan and American forensic pathologist Margaret Campbell;

- the Enzo Files, featuring Scottish forensic scientist Enzo MacLeod, which is set in France. The sixth and final Enzo book is Cast Iron (January 2017, Riverrun).

He has also written several standalone books:

- I'll Keep You Safe (January 2018, Riverrun)

- Entry Island (January 2014, Quercus UK)

- Runaway (January 2015, Quercus UK)

- Coffin Road (January 2016, Riverrun)

May had a successful career as a television writer, creator, and producer.

One of Scotland's most prolific television dramatists, he garnered more than 1000 credits in 15 years as scriptwriter and script editor on prime-time British television drama. He is the creator of three major television drama series and presided over two of the highest-rated serials in his homeland before quitting television to concentrate on his first love, writing novels.

Born and raised in Scotland he lives in France.

His breakthrough as a best-selling author came with The Lewis Trilogy. After being turned down by all the major UK publishers, the first of the The Lewis Trilogy - The Blackhouse - was published in France as L'Ile des Chasseurs d'Oiseaux where it was hailed as "a masterpiece" by the French national newspaper L'Humanité. His novels have a large following in France. The trilogy has won several French literature awards, including one of the world's largest adjudicated readers awards, the Prix Cezam.

The Blackhouse was published in English by the award-winning Quercus (a relatively young publishing house which did not exist when the book was first presented to British publishers). It went on to become an international best seller, and was shortlisted for both Barry Award and Macavity Award when it was published in the USA.

The Blackhouse won the US Barry Award for Best Mystery Novel at Bouchercon in Albany NY, in 2013.

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