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Reviews/Books
The Falls
Ian Rankin
reviewed by Gundula
This is the latest in the DI John Rebus series.
A student has gone missing. That wouldn’t be overly exciting, if she wasn’t Philippa Balfour, the daughter of a high profile Edinburgh bank manager. Thus, the whole machinery of the Edinburgh police is
set in motion, every available officer assigned to the task, even a retired forensic pathologist has to be reactivated.
Among this force are Rebus and his colleagues. Everyone follows their own instincts, leading them along different trails and to the side of all this, little personal dramas unfold.
Siobhan is in hot pursuit of “Quizmaster”, the great unknown who posed riddles on the Internet to Philippa and now taunts Siobhan to find the answers that might lead her closer to Philippa and her
fate.
All the while Siobhan has to recruit colleagues for help and at the same time ward off their unwelcome advances. But how unwelcome are they really…
Rebus, as always, is off on his own personal trail, leading him via the Arthur’s Seat coffins (tiny wooden coffins found at Arthur’s Seat in 1836) and some of their younger cousins (found all over
Scotland 150 years later) to The Falls, Philippa’s family home, where the latest little coffin was found. Is there any connection between the coffins? Do they hint to crimes or are they just historical
curiosities? And how does the latest find tie in?
If he is actually helping Philippa or just digging up old stories that may or may not hint to crimes, nobody knows, but Rebus is determined to find out. And as the attractive museum curator comes with the
coffins, Rebus doesn’t mind spending lots of time with them.
The book starts off with interesting new ideas, including on the one hand the internet and computerworks as a modern aspect of the case, on the other hand approaching it from times long gone, when Burke
and Hare roamed the streets of Edinburgh and the Arthur’s Seat coffins where discovered. I quite liked this medley of past and future and was interested to see where it all would end. Unfortunately the
end was very foreseeable and lacking in imagination; an anticlimax.
On the way there Rebus presents himself as the usual individualistic rebel, succumbing to his ghosts when off-duty. I have probably read too many Rebus novels (all of them), but by now his whining and
seeking refuge in alcohol are getting on my nerves. In this book I didn’t like Rebus very much, couldn’t sympathize with him anymore. His “heroic” (and public) sacrifices are out of place and if he’s got
so much trouble with his ghosts, why doesn’t he try confronting them for a change? Or go for therapy?
But maybe that’s just the way Rebus is heading to make way for Siobhan? She plays a much greater part in this book than previously, seems to be on her way into the limelight. She learned her trade mainly
from Rebus and that shows in her every move. She still has her individual style, but Siobhan as well as Rebus realize how much she thinks and acts like him. One difference lies in their opposite gender
partners: while Rebus never really seems to get lucky (or even care about it), Siobhan has to fend off unwanted attention. Leaving both equally alone.
Rebus is by now close enough to retirement for Rankin to have to find a successor. Maybe The Falls is the beginning of a new era? That of a female DI as the main character? We might know more after the
next book.
Matthew went to a book presentation by Ian Rankin and got a signed copy of this book. I am very proud of it.
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