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Under Suspicion

Published by Allison and Busby

PROVING they are not just some literary novelty act, the Mulgray twins are back with a second outing for their intrepid undercover Revenue and Customs investigator, DJ Smith.

Inseparable since birth, identical twin sisters Helen and Morna Mulgray live together in Edinburgh, dress alike and, after both retiring as English teachers, now share writing credits for Under Suspicion, the follow-up to last year’s debut, No Suspicious Circumstances.

This time, the action moves from the White Heather Hotel to the Tenerife lair of international crime lord Ambrose Vanheusen, where our heroine uncovers a seedy underworld of money laundering, drug dealing and murder.

Every good investigator needs a sidekick. Holmes had Watson, Rebus had Siobhan and DJ Smith has Gorzonzola – a moth-eaten Persian cat with an uncanny knack for sniffing out trouble. Here, she takes centre stage, opening the door to Vanheusen’s world and unwittingly drawing her mistress into danger as she becomes the target of his feline obsession.

DJ Smith’s character is fleshed out a little here. We learn her first name, for instance, and a little about her work mates. There’s even a chaste kiss or two, but readers might like to see her personality developed more in future if they’re to care about her in the many death-defying situations she finds herself in.

Fans of gritty realism may find Under Suspicion a little cliched and lacking in pace, but if you enjoyed the gentle mayhem of No Suspicious Circumstances – now out in paperback – and like your villains cartoonish and your murder mysteries washed clean of the blood and gore, you’ll lap it up.

Morag Lindsay