Buried in a Shetland Tomb
Buried in a Shetland Tomb (The Trowie Mound Murders)
When a visiting yachting couple go missing from the Shetland oil capital of Brae, sailing skipper Cass Lynch overcomes her mistrust of the land world to ask for help from her old adversary DI Gavin Macrae. He suspects a link to international art theft, and warns Cass to steer clear – but when one of her sailing pupils goes missing, she goes alone to discover the secrets of the Neolithic tomb known locally as a ‘trowie mound’. Ghosts, folklore and a nail-biting finale at the local show come together to make an atmospheric, fast-moving thriller.
Praise for Buried in a Shetland Tomb (The Trowie Mound Murders)
“...Shetland’s landscape, sea ways, and history are integral to the plot as is its language (there's a handy glossary at the back for dialect words) which really gives a sense of the place. ... I'm really excited about the next book, it's going to be fun seeing what Cass does next.”
— Desperate Reader blogspot
Cass talks about the house she grew up in on the island of Muckle Roe. Here’s just the place, almost at the end of the road, with a beach to launch her Mirror dinghy, Osprey.
Pico dinghies sailing at Brae, with the RIB keeping guard.
Mirror dinghies racing at Brae.
This is a small Shetland chambered cairn, on the island of Vementry. This is the outer wall; bodies would have been laid out below it.
Here you can see a bit of the chambered cairn interior (it was excavated and left open in Victorian times), and the view across the Røna to Muckle Roe and northwards.
Aith Ladies Lifeboat Guild Souvenirs Secretary Catriona Anderson in charge of her stall at Voe Show.
Looking down on the pier at Voe from the hill below the show ground.
Author Comment
This was the first book in which I consciously set out to ‘showcase’ Shetland seasons and events – summer, and the Voe show. The story was inspired by a visit to two Orkney chambered cairns, the spectacular Maes Howe and the Tomb of the Eagles, as well as by the one on Vementry. I found Maes Howe both creepy and claustrophobic, and thought ‘I’d hate to be shut alone in here!’ Naturally, my next thought was how much Cass would hate it, and I spent the next while working out why she’d be in there, and, more importantly, how she’d get out of it by herself – which brought in the tunnel, the kitten ...