‘The Winter Dead’ by Lynne McEwan

Published by Canelo,
6 November 2025.
ISBN: 978-1-83598-068-2 (PB)

DI Shona Oliver is one very busy lady. Both her personal and professional lives are full of drama. When we first meet Shona, she is a volunteer on the local lifeboat helping to rescue an injured kitesurfer stranded on a perilous beach. Once back on the Scottish uplands, currently covered in a thick blanket of snow, Shona has to unravel how a well-liked forest ranger, John MacFarlane, missing from his cottage in the Dalgeddie forest, is found in a coastal cave miles from his home. Who took him there? Was he killed by tree rustlers or predators involved in illegal activity targeted at local eagles, or was the killing totally unconnected with his current work? Investigating the ranger’s death is not the only problem Shona and her colleagues, DS Murdo O’Halloran, and several young constables have on their hands. They are also tasked with finding an errant poet from Cumbria who is missing in their area and tracing the rightful owner, and establishing the authenticity of, a beautiful painting of the Madonna that has been handed into the police station. 

On the home front, husband Rob is still in prison for supposed financial fraud. His brother, Sandy, runs a local auction house but is reluctant to help Shona find an owner for the missing picture. Shona is also stressed because suspicion she was involved with the misdeeds of her former boss is still hanging over her. Thankfully she has no B&B guests, though some are expected soon. Her daughter, Becky, is now at Glasgow University. Becky is traumatized and needs counselling because Jack Rutherford, one of her flat mates, has been stabbed and is dangerously ill in hospital. Despite his own fears and worries, Jack’s father, Simon, supports Becky and is a good friend, or possibly potentially more, to Shona whose marriage appears to be irretrievably broken. 

Lynne McEwan weaves this multiplicity of threads together with consummate skill whilst still managing to portray her characters as a collection of varied and entirely believable human beings with their attendant problems and little professional jealousies.  A wide variety of locations and activities: pubs, witnesses’ homes, caves threatened by the incoming tide, walking through the sea over possible quick sands and a search and rescue operation in a snowy Dalgeddie forest etc. are described with terrifying intensity and photographic accuracy. And, just when you think everything is beginning to settle down, there is a jaw dropping, personal revelation at the end of the book.  Unfortunately, we will have to wait for the next episode to see how Shona deals with it.

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Reviewer: Angela Crowther 

Lynne McEwan was born in Glasgow. She is a former newspaper photographer turned crime author. She’s covered stories including the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the first Gulf War in addition to many high-profile murder cases. Her DI Shona Oliver series is set on the beautiful Solway Firth which forms the border between Scotland and England, and where Shona is also a lifeboat volunteer. Lynne is a graduate of the University of East Anglia's Creative Writing Programme and splits her time between Lincolnshire and Scotland.

Angela Crowther is a retired scientist.  She has published many scientific papers but, as yet, no crime fiction.  In her spare time Angela belongs to a Handbell Ringing group, goes country dancing and enjoys listening to music, particularly the operas of Verdi and Wagner.