The Bones Beneath - Mark Billingham
Digging up the past There'll be a few eyebrows raised at the realisation that not only does Tom Thorne not get fired after the fiasco of his action in The Dying Hours , but he actually gets promoted. Or rather, reinstated back to his position as Detective Inspector. Billingham slightly glosses over this issue - investigation ongoing - but does present a kind of rationale for it. Thorne is needed for a very special task, a prisoner escort operation to locate a buried body that a serial killer has owned up to many years after his imprisonment. Thorne is needed because he's had dealings with the prisoner in the past. A guy called Stuart Nicklin. Having Thorne back as DI and bringing back Stuart Nicklin (from Scaredy Cat ) would seem like Billingham is returning to safe and familiar ground, but surprisingly, The Bones Beneath takes Thorne away from his familiar London stomping grounds for a very different setting - a small remote island off the coast of Wales, Bardsey Island. As y...