Past crimes never really fade from memory . . .

When Thomas Magner’s business partner is found dead in his own car on the outskirts of Anstruther, all evidence points to suicide. Meanwhile, Magner himself, a wealthy property developer, is under investigation for a series of alleged rapes from thirty years ago. In total fifteen women are prepared to go to court to testify against Magner, but one by one they withdraw their complaints without explanation until only five remain. With the CPS now reconsidering its case, one of Magner’s accusers is killed in a hit-and-run. The car used in the crime is discovered abandoned – and registered to one T Magner.

DCI Andy Gilchrist is assigned to the hit-and-run case and soon discovers that Magner’s murky past is very much seeping into the present. How did he acquire his wealth? How did his first wife die? And why did his business partner commit suicide?

And was Magner a serial rapist in his youth? Or was he something far worse . . .




‘Rebus did it for Edinburgh. Laidlaw did it for Glasgow. Gilchrist might just be the bloke to put St Andrews on the crime fiction map.’
Daily Record


‘A bright new recruit to the swelling army of Scots crime writers.’ Quintin Jardine