The Rough Collier

February 18, 2008
McIntosh's fifth medieval whodunit to feature Archbishop's Quaestor (constable) Gil Cunningham (after 2007's St. Mungo's Robin
) may frustrate some mystery fans because whether a conventional crime has been committed is unclear for a long time. When a corpse turns up in a peat bog, its skull crushed and throat slit, in Beltane parish outside Glasgow, no one has a clue how long the remains have been buried. The parish chaplain blames village healer Beatrice “Beattie” Lithgo and demands her arrest based on his obsessive reading of a tome on witchcraft. Gil and his new bride, Alys Mason, try to identify the body and clear Beattie's name, traveling from haunted coal mines to the coast, where they interview “salt boilers” who may have known the victim, rumored to be decadent fee collector Thomas Murray. More cadavers spark lurid allegations about Murray's relationship with a young collier (coal miner) and other missing men. An unconvincing confession briefly distracts Gil and Alys from the case's shocking resolution. U.S. readers should be prepared for plenty of Scottish brogue (“I wouldny ken about that”).

April 1, 2008
Glaswegian Gil Cunningham makes a welcome return in this authentically detailed historical whodunit. Together with his lovely but intrepid wife, Alys, Gil investigates the murder of an unidentified man unceremoniously laid to rest in a peat bog. When peat cutters discover the body near his mothers rural estate, they immediately send for Gil, the archbishops questioner. Though a group of frenzied locals accuse an innocent woman of witchcraft, Gil and Alys dig deeper, uncovering a string of suspicious deaths that stretch back years in time. Trapped in a minewith a cold-blooded killer, Alys extracts the confession that clears an innocent suspect who stands ready to take the blame. McIntosh artfully interweaves intrigue and history in this suspenseful medieval murder tale.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)