In brief:The sadistic murder of a young oil worker, the fallout from a long-ago possible miscarriage of justice, a Glasgow drug-dealing ring and Johnny Bible, whose serial murders echo those of Bible John in the 60s: these are the closely interwoven cases with which DI John Rebus must contend. Investigating in his own characteristic unorthodox fashion, Rebus soon finds himself under fire from all quarters.

In detail:In the ninth in Ian Rankin’s Rebus series, John Rebus is faced with a host of demons from his past: intense media interest in the Spaven murder case on which he and his mentor Lawson Geddes had worked together; the serial murders which seem to be a chilling homage to Bible John, with whom Rebus is more than a little obsessed; the struggle of his colleague Brian Holmes in balancing his marriage with his job, a painful reminder of Rebus’s own failed marriage; and not least, the demon drink and its attendant nightmares. Black and Blue is a tightly plotted, highly complex detective novel with all the elements associated with the genre, yet the psychology of John Rebus takes centre stage and is every bit as gripping as the novel’s four closely interwoven cases.

On secondment to Craigmillar police station in Edinburgh’s roughest district, Rebus begins an investigation into the murder of Allan Mitchison that will take him from Edinburgh to Glasgow, then to Aberdeen and beyond. Mitchison, a self-effacing maintenance man on the soon-to-be-decommissioned Bannock platform, died in horrible circumstances that bear the hallmark of Tony El, a known Glasgow killer. Following Tony’s trail Rebus finds himself distracted by the case of Johnny Bible, whose serial murders have gripped the media. Rebus has his own unwelcome media spotlight to deal with when a TV company decides to make a programme about the Spaven case, suggesting a miscarriage of justice. Rebus takes off to Aberdeen and soon discovers a multitude of links between Mitchison’s death, the activities in Aberdeen of the drug ring with which Tony El had been involved, and the Johnny Bible killings, not to mention crooked coppers doing their best to throw him off track. Aided by his friend, colleague and minder Jack Morton, Rebus uses his own maverick methods to get at the truth, or as much of it as he can find.

About the author

Born in 1960 in the mining village of Cardenden, Fife, Ian Rankin graduated from the University of Edinburgh. He has been employed as a grape-picker, swineherd, taxman, alcohol researcher, hi-fi journalist and punk musician, and spent several years working towards a PhD on modern Scottish fiction before becoming distracted by his own writing. As well as writing under his own name, Rankin has written a number of novels under the pseudonym Jack Harvey. Black and Blue was published in 1997. It won the Crime Writers’ Association Macallan Gold Dagger Award and secured Rankin a place as one of Britain’s top crime writers. His work now appears on a number of university syllabuses. Ian Rankin has regularly contributed to BBC2’s Newsnight Review.

For discussion

• ‘I’d say it was a straight assassination, with a bit of malicious cruelty thrown in.’ (page 30). Does this prove to be the case with Allan Mitchison’s murder? What was the motive behind the killing?
• Why is it so important for Rebus to avoid the fallout from the Spaven case? Is it simply his dislike of the media or are there more deep-seated reasons? How is the case resolved and how does Rebus feel about it?
• ‘Spinning in a narrowing gyre: Allan Mitchison…Johnny Bible…Uncle Joe…Fergus McLure’s drug deal.’ (page 202). Are there connections between these four, and if so what are they?
• Why is Rebus so fascinated with the Bible John and Johnny Bible cases? At what point did you realise Bible John’s identity and why?
• How would you describe Rebus’s character? If you have read any of the preceding novels in the Rebus series how would you say his character has developed?
• What kind of detective is Rebus? How does he compare with the other police characters in the novel? How does he get on with other detectives?
• There are few female characters in the novel. How does Rebus relate to women? How does his work affect his relationships?
• ‘Work had a way of wrapping itself around you, so you were cut off from the rest of the world.’ (page 372) How does Rankin depict the life of a detective?
• What did you make of the book’s ending? Did the Afterword make you think differently about the novel, and if so how?
• Black and Blue ranges from Edinburgh to Glasgow to Aberdeen and the oilfields beyond. How important is a sense of place in the novel, and how does Rankin evoke that sense?
• How does Rankin build suspense in the novel?
• Black and Blue is a crime novel but Rankin spends as much time on the psychology of his characters as on the resolution of the crimes. Which element in the novel did you find most satisfying and why?
  

Suggested further reading

The Crow Road by Iain Banks
The Black Echo by Michael Connelly
Survival of the Fittest by Jonathan Kellerman
Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell