The third Inspector Rebus novel feels like another departure. Well written with an intense mystery, the tone is unlike the others in the series so far. Reading them back to back, this seems like a one off in style, like he was trying to merge his detective series with another genre. I'd prefer he stick with Rebus in an Edinburgh crime story, instead of a London serial killer story. Still a great read though, it was published in 1992.
Tooth And Nail was originally to be called Wolfman. Rankin has taken Rebus out of Edinburgh, sending him to London to help with a series of killings. A serial murderer has been nicknamed 'Wolfman', for the first killing was on Wolf St., and the killer has a penchant for biting his victims after death. Rebus is out of his element and not very impressed with London. He is there at the request of Detective Inspector Flight whom he befriends, along with a young woman studying criminology who wants to offer psychological advice on the case and herself for an affair. There are implications the killer may be a female, or perhaps someone high in society. Regardless, we know from chapters narrated by the killer they are a true psychopath, whose desire to kill can no longer be satiated and whose attentions are eventually drawn to Rebus.
Tooth And Nail features great character building, not just for Rebus (his wife and daughter are in now living in London as well), but for Inspector Flight and Dr. Liza Fraser. Rankin has said he was impressed by The Silence Of The Lambs and wanted to write something similar, so we have lots of pathology reports and autopsies (new for the series), an annoying detective named Lamb, and the investigation team which works in the 'murder room'. This feels more like Rebus vacationing in the serial killer genre rather than a Rebus series novel featuring a serial killer. The tone is very different, although he is introducing more Scottish phrases the Londoners don't understand, and the use of nicknames and puns is growing.
It was a good novel - on point for the time it was written. His penchant for airing societies dirty laundry and intriguing characters makes the series an entertaining read, and with Tooth And Nail Rankin's popularity was growing.
Certainly entertaining and interesting, but not as good as what is to come in book four ~ Strip Jack
1992 / Paperback / 275 pages
Comentarios