Blood hunt: a novel

Fans of Rankin's gold-standard Inspector Rebus series need to know that Blood Hunt0 is not0 the latest installment. With the author's name deservedly the perfect marketing tool, the publishers are reprinting another book (like Witch Hunt, 0 2004) that Rankin, writing as Jack Harvey, originally published in the UK in the 1990s. Unlike the Rebus procedurals, which pit a contrarian cop against his own demons in an unrelentingly gritty Edinburgh, this globe-trotting tale delivers more traditional thrills. Gordon Reeve is an ex-SAS soldier who now makes his living training weekend warriors in rural Scotland. Told that his brother has committed suicide in California, Reeve goes to the funeral and quickly decides that the investigative reporter was murdered. Trying to get the story and then revenge, he finds himself pitted against both an amoral chemical conglomerate and an unwelcome face from his own past. Reeve is no Rebus--though he battles his ferocious temper, he's too efficient a killing machine to be as deeply interesting--but those who like their thrillers fast and chilling will be in miserable bliss. This 10-year-old novel ties in perfectly to today's concerns about multinationals and big-business science--the poisons in men's hearts that leach out into the world. Not Rankin's best but still awfully good. --Keir Graff Copyright 2006 Booklist

Admirers of Edgar-winner Rankin's bestselling series featuring Edinburgh's Insp. John Rebus (Fleshmarket Alley, etc.) may be disappointed by this stand-alone suspense novel, which has more in common with the works of Frederick Forsyth and Robert Ludlum. Gordon Reeve, an ex-Special Forces soldier with serious anger management issues, has settled down to a tranquil second career running a survival camp in a remote part of Scotland. When he learns that his journalist brother, Jim, with whom he hadn't been close for years, has shot himself in California, Reeve resolves to seek answers. Once in the U.S., Reeve begins to suspect that his brother was murdered because of an investigative piece he was working on involving a major chemical company. But that Grisham-like plot is soon made secondary to a game of cat and mouse Reeve plays with a deranged former military colleague, leading to an anticlimactic and predictable ending. Rankin's gifts as a writer will have many quickly turning the pages, but longtime fans will hope for a return to form in his next outing. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Rankin takes a break from his Inspector Rebus series to pen this standalone about a former British soldier convinced that his brother did not commit suicide. With a ten-city tour. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

A stand-alone thriller from the British bestselling author. Forsaking Edinburgh's iconoclastic Inspector Rebus (Fleshmarket Alley, 2005, etc.), Rankin here offers up Gordon Reeve, ex-SAS soldier now operating a survival course for weekend warriors on Skivald, a small island off South Uist, Scotland. When he receives word that his brother Jim, a freelance journalist in California, has committed suicide, Gordon flies off to San Diego to claim his body. Despite the assurances of local cop Mike McCluskey that Jim did indeed kill himself, Gordon, relying on his SAS skills and instincts, decides that it was murder--a call that might explain why he's soon being tailed, hassled and shot at when he follows up on Jim's last assignment. Who or what was the Agrippa in Jim's notes? The search for the answer will introduce Gordon to the chicanery of Jeffrey Allerdyce, of D.C.'s Alliance Investigation, and the global pesticide destruction sanctioned by Co-World Chemicals' Mr. Kosigin, whose enforcer turns out to be Gordon's Falklands campaign nemesis, the mercenary Jay. Crisscrossing the states and Europe, leaving a trail of bodies as he goes, Gordon winds up back on Skivald for a confrontation with ten men, then nine, then eight . . . until he exacts revenge on the one man who's bedeviled him for years. Rankin, who can outwrite most anybody in the business, drops one clue too many early on, but he's so deft at maintaining a breakneck pace, so accomplished at conveying anger turned to fury and so gleeful in itemizing munitions that readers will zip right along as he swings from whodunit to international conspiracy plot to war-story retribution. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Fans of Rankin's gold-standard Inspector Rebus series need to know that Blood Hunt is not the latest installment. With the author's name deservedly the perfect marketing tool, the publishers are reprinting another book (like Witch Hunt, 2004) that Rankin, writing as Jack Harvey, originally published in the UK in the 1990s. Unlike the Rebus procedurals, which pit a contrarian cop against his own demons in an unrelentingly gritty Edinburgh, this globe-trotting tale delivers more traditional thrills. Gordon Reeve is an ex-SAS soldier who now makes his living training weekend warriors in rural Scotland. Told that his brother has committed suicide in California, Reeve goes to the funeral and quickly decides that the investigative reporter was murdered. Trying to get the story and then revenge, he finds himself pitted against both an amoral chemical conglomerate and an unwelcome face from his own past. Reeve is no Rebus--though he battles his ferocious temper, he's too efficient a killing machine to be as deeply interesting--but those who like their thrillers fast and chilling will be in miserable bliss. This 10-year-old novel ties in perfectly to today's concerns about multinationals and big-business science--the poisons in men's hearts that leach out into the world. Not Rankin's best but still awfully good. ((Reviewed January 1 & 15, 2006)) Copyright 2006 Booklist Reviews.

Rankin takes a break from his Inspector Rebus series to pen this standalone about a former British soldier convinced that his brother did not commit suicide. With a ten-city tour. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Better known as the villain of Knots and Crosses, George Reeve stars as the hero of this effort by Edgar Award-winning author Rankin, who previously released this title under the pseudonym of Jack Harvey. When Reeve's journalist brother, Jim, dies of an apparent suicide while investigating a story, George flies to America to retrieve the body for burial. Unable to see his brother as the suicidal type, he begins an investigation that eventually leads to a corporate cover-up. George is soon gripped with the need to exact revenge for his brother's death while attempting to avoid slipping back into his violent, military past. Rankin's skill is evident, but this novel isn't as gripping as those in the Inspector Rebus series. George simply isn't that likable, and the sections involving computer technology seem dated. Still, it's interesting to see what Rankin was working on during the early days of his Rebus novels, and readers of that series will likely want to pick this one up. Because of Rebus's popularity, this book is recommended for all public libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 11/15/05.]--Craig Shufelt, Lane P.L., Oxford, OH

Admirers of Edgar-winner Rankin's bestselling series featuring Edinburgh's Insp. John Rebus (Fleshmarket Alley , etc.) may be disappointed by this stand-alone suspense novel, which has more in common with the works of Frederick Forsyth and Robert Ludlum. Gordon Reeve, an ex-Special Forces soldier with serious anger management issues, has settled down to a tranquil second career running a survival camp in a remote part of Scotland. When he learns that his journalist brother, Jim, with whom he hadn't been close for years, has shot himself in California, Reeve resolves to seek answers. Once in the U.S., Reeve begins to suspect that his brother was murdered because of an investigative piece he was working on involving a major chemical company. But that Grisham-like plot is soon made secondary to a game of cat and mouse Reeve plays with a deranged former military colleague, leading to an anticlimactic and predictable ending. Rankin's gifts as a writer will have many quickly turning the pages, but longtime fans will hope for a return to form in his next outing. (Mar.)