Thursday 16th November - 7.30pm Porteous, Juniper Green

Douglas Skelton

Mystery and History in the Highlands

Douglas has been a bank clerk, tax officer, taxi driver (two days), wine waiter (two hours), journalist and investigator. The gritty experience of life's underside gained in his latter roles is distilled in his work and now he is a crime writer who specialises in fiction and non-fiction from the darker side of our world. After several true crime and Scottish criminal history books charting the exploits of murderers, criminals and cause celebres, these days he concentrates on fiction. The settings for his crime fiction range from the tough streets of his home town of Glasgow to the wildness of the Scottish highlands. His first Rebecca Connolly book was longlisted for the McIlvanney. In the latest, Children of the Mist, Fergus MacGregor disappears and is never seen again. Years later, Rebecca witnesses his mother holding a ritual in the Black Wood of Rannoch, a place Fergus loved. What happened in this last vestige of the Caledonian Forest? Does a family feud hold the key? Does an old recluse have the answers? Or is something malevolent hiding among the ancient trees? PLEASE NOTE THAT DENISE MINA HAS HAD TO CANCEL HER APPEARANCE AT THIS EVENT .