Coffin Road by Peter May

Author : Peter May
Tile : Coffin Road
Published : 2016
Publisher : River Run
Genre : Crime / Thriller
Pages : 400

     A man stands bewildered on a deserted beach on the Hebridean Isle of Harris. He cannot remember who he is. The only clue to his identity is a folded map of a path named the Coffin Road. He does not know where this search will take him. A detective from Lewis sits aboard a boat, filled with doubt. DS George Gunn knows that a bludgeoned corpse has been discovered on a remote rock twenty miles offshore. He does not know if he has what it takes to uncover how and why. A teenage girl lies in her Edinburgh bedroom, desperate to discover the truth about her scientist father's suicide. Two years on, Karen Fleming still cannot accept that he would willfully abandon her. She does not yet know his secret.

     This is my second time coming to this author, the first was with The Fourth Sacrifice. With the first book, the author took me back to my travels in China and also delivered an amazing thriller to boot. So I was looking forward to getting reacquainted with him, this time a little closer to home. While I have never actually visited Scotland I have read about it a few times, It's still on my list of places to visit. From my understanding, the Hebridean Islands have a special charm of there own. It is also a place not many choose to call home. So the thought of a crime thriller being set here was an intriguing one. 

     The author descriptions of the Hebrides gave me a wonderful insight into this community and a place far from anything I've known. It strikes me as a great place to set a crime thriller, while the actually Islands themselves have a very low crime rate. Being remote of the coast of Scotland they lend themselves to claustrophobic and haunting stories, all the while delivering a whole lot of intrigue. The book is spilt between three different points of view each with there own mystery to solve. With every strand, their stories get pulled closer and closer together. While a lot of people would usually be pulled to the detective as their prime focus it was Karen's story that pulled me in the most. Her quest to try and find what truly happen to her father resonated the most with me. As children, I can't help but feel we never truly know who is parents are. They have had lives most of us will never really know.

     I have to confess this book was not what I thought it was going into it. The plot went off in a completely different direction than I had been expecting. It's always a good feeling when an author can completely surprise you. He created a mystery that goes deep into to problem that is facing us all, which I can't go into as it would give the whole book away. With the three separate strands, it pushed the book in multiple directions all the while each one hinting at clues to the others. This book is intelligently written and kept me guessing as to the true heart of its lies and deception. The author has once again proved to me that he is a master at the long story. He finds ways to twist around previous chapters and more than once left me saying huh. There is a true balance to this book that pays off so well for me. When I came to the final few chapters I can honestly say I did not see it coming. As for anyone who reads a lot of crime fiction, this is a big bonus to often for most of use our brains have at least an inkling as to the final outcome. 

     Peter may have now become an author I trust a great deal and this is with good reason. This book is a great way to spend a few hours. I'm already looking forward to my next visit, to see what he has to offer next.