Arboath Smokie Slaying
February 15th, 2021. Filed under: Monday's Musings.
On a culinary tour of the British Isles, a retired detective and a failed police dog intend to taste the kippers that made the town famous …
… but when the first person they meet turns up dead a few hours later in an apparent suicide neither one of them believes, both man and dog must accept they’ve stumbled into another mystery.
All too soon, they wish they hadn’t poked their noses in because what they have uncovered could be truly sinister.
Hidden in the past, a crime few know about yearns to be revealed, but there are some who will do anything to ensure the secret never sees the light of day.
Is the slaying finished?
Baking. It can get a guy killed.
ISLALND BREEZES
Albert, a retired detective, and Rex, a former police dog whose attitude got him bounced from the force, are touring around England to taste and learn to make some of Albert’s favorite foods. Rex’s favorite foods are anything edible.
The smokies take him over into Scotland’s historic Arbroath to find this favorite. It turned into a very fishy visit.
Rex can always find the clues and criminal before Albert. Rex can’t understand why his human can’t smell what’s right in front of him.
Poor Rex manages to irritate a bunch of seagulls who then target him often enough that he becomes paranoid. He needs to form a gang to take them down, but the other dogs are afraid of those birds.
Albert is also on the trail of a gastrothief who keeps abducting the best of the best in every town and village to which Albert ventures. Will a chef or someone be abducted in Arbroath?
Thank you, Mr Higgs, for giving us Albert and Rex.
***Book received from the author without charge.***
When Steve Higgs wrote his debut novel, Paranormal Nonsense, he was a Captain in the British Army. He would love to pretend that he had one of those careers that has to be redacted and in general denied by the government and that he has had to change his name and continually move about because he is still on the watch list in several countries. In truth though, he started out as a mechanic, no not like Jason Statham, sneaking about as a contract killer, more like one of those greasy gits that charge you a fortune and keep your car for a week when all you went in for was a squeaky door hinge.
At school, he was mostly disinterested in every subject except creative writing, for which, at age ten, he won his first award. However, calling it his first award suggests that there have been more, which there have not. Accolades may come but, in the meantime, he is having a ball writing mystery stories and crime thrillers and claims to have more than a hundred books forming an unruly queue in his head as they clamor to get out.
Now retired from the military, he lives in the south-east corner of England with a trio of lazy sausage dogs. Surrounded by rolling hills, brooding castles and vineyards, he doubts he will ever leave, the beer is just too good.