A couple of years ago I caught some of the BBC’s productions of Ian Rankin’s Inspector Rebus tales, with the Edinburgh police inspector nicely done by Ken Stott. More recently I’ve been grabbing some of the books (there are about 18, between novels and collections) from Mountain View Public Library, so far all quite enjoyable.
Strip Jack is one of the earlier novels, from 1993, when Rebus is sort of between Brian Holmes and Siobhan Clark as his junior. The title character is Gregor Jack, Member of Parliament for a fictional constituency of North and South Esk in Edinburgh, who we meet when the commander of Rebus’ CID unit puts on a full-blown raid of a brothel in ‘a nice neighborhood’ and Rebus finds Jack in with one of the girls.
Jack was clearly the victim of a setup since (a) he wasn’t there for sex and (b) the London papers were there to photograph his perp walk. This causes a seven day wonder and has Rebus off his feed because the whole thing doesn’t pass his smell test. So despite his superiors’ wishing otherwise John continues to poke around while working other cases.
One of which is the theft of a half dozen valuable books from the unlocked office of a university professor. This takes him to a used book store that, just coincidentally, is owned by MP Jack in partnership with a school chum nicknamed Suey, short for his failed suicide attempt at age 18.
Something that’s got up Rebus’ backside is that he cannot contact Mrs. Jack. She, it seems, brought big money and a lovely smile to the marriage but never outgrew the wild party phase so no one is sure if she’s at the couple country cottage or in the south of France with a boy toy.
Until the wild child turns up dead, her body found in a river in a manner that’s quite similar to another female corpse found about two weeks previously. Of course there’s a nut job who confesses…
I really enjoyed Rankin’s cranky, irrascible treatment of John Rebus and the Scottish color.
recommended
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