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After the death of his mother and the end of his father's high-powered career, Zach and his Dad have come to the north of Scotland to live rent-free in Grandfather Alistair's cliff-top cottage. Dad asks Zach to clean out the old garden pond, a rotting nightmare where not even a tadpole can survive. But when he drains the pond, he unearths something unexpected- a trapdoor leading down into darkness... He ventures down there and discovers something amazing - a glowing egg-shaped stone. Once brought back to the surface, Zach's run of bad luck seems to change entirely. Suddenly, he can't seem to stop winning and even Dad's career is unexpectedly back on track. But good luck can't last forever... The stone belongs to a race of ancient creatures that dwell deep beneath the ground - and they want it back. Pretty soon, unspeakable things begin to claw their way to the surface in search of the stone - and for Zach and his new friend, Pepper, there's one all-important question. Can they stay alive until morning?

Third in the Connor Montrose series by Mark Leggatt, following on from the success of Names of the Dead and The London Cage. Ex-CIA technician Connor Montrose tracks two suspected terrorists to a deserted mountain village in Tuscany, where he witnesses an attack on a US Air Force troop plane, using a ground-breaking portable Surface to Air (SAM) missile. Unaware that the CIA were also monitoring the suspects, Montrose is blamed for the attack and narrowly escapes. The CIA receive orders from Washington to shoot him on sight, and a shadowy organisation begins to track his every move. Then a spate of terror attacks threatens the fabric of NATO and the entire Western alliance. Civilian airlines are the new target, and the overwhelming evidence points to a CIA false flag plan to bring down aircraft and blame it on Moscow-backed terrorists. Montrose's investigations lead him to underground arms sales on The Silk Road, the secret marketplace of the internet, hidden deep in the Dark Web. Montrose must assimilate himself into the society of the European aristocracy and the ultra-rich fascists, assisted by Kirsty Rhys, to pose as a middleman for the purchase of arms on The Silk Road and find the remaining cache of missiles. Montrose uncovers the layers of duplicity between governments and arms dealers, leading first to the CIA in Rome, and eventually to the palaces of the last Russia Tsar and the new oligarchs. Montrose must discover the remaining cache of missiles before the CIA catch up with him, and before carnage is unleashed over the skies of Europe.

Drew Selkirk, a young Border ploughman, falls out with the landed Drongans, joins the army, and finds himself in action in the Boer War. The terrible set-piece early battles are vividly described as Selkirk is trapped in the besieged town of Kimberley. Seconded to a unit of irregular horse, Selkirk uses his Borders knowledge of horsemanship to outwit the Boers, while struggling with conflicting romantic encounters.

Newly commissioned, Selkirk is ordered to form his own unit of irregular horse and treks across Africa to forestall a dangerous enemy incursion. His farming background gives him empathy with a Boer family, one of whose daughters is actively fighting with a Boer commando, but once again he crosses the Drongans.

From tedious blockhouse duty, Selkirk's Reivers take on another dangerous mission, and come against an irregular outlaw band, as well as Boer bitter-enders. Peace comes, and Selkirk returns to Scotland, where events take surprising turns, before resolving his tangled personal life with a peaceful and charming end to the story.

When postman, David Christie, finds a strangely carved box in his garden, he does not realise that his life is about to change. First the enigmatic Professor Jorunn Nechtan offers to buy the box, and then helps him lose his job. Gradually David is drawn into a web of intrigue that spans the centuries from prehistory to the present day, in which his wife, Catriona, plays a prominent role. Set in a Dundee where nothing is quite what it seems, Mother Law illuminates many periods of the city's historical past through David's eyes. He meets Bronwen, one of the mysterious People of Peace who claim to be the original inhabitants of the land, and relives a previous life when General Monck's army destroys the city in 1651. With Bronwen fighting Jorunn for his support, David starts a new career as a boat operator, and steers a middle course over the Tay to find a missing manuscript that will restore balance to the world.

From the glamorous, decadent resort of Marbella to the mean, dark and dangerous East End of Glasgow, The Reckoning follows the new generation of bitter enemies, the Coyles and the McClellandsThe feud between the families which has spanned decades should be over, following the deaths of mother and son, Diane and Bobby Mack, but someone is hell bent on exacting revenge for their deaths.The unknown enemy leaves a trail of despair and pushes the head of the Coyle family to the brink of destruction.A tale of murder, extortion and drug smuggling, there can only be one winner; but who?

When Detective Sergeant James Mendick is sent to find the Duke of Mathon's stolen yacht, he soon realises that this is no ordinary case. Trapped aboard a mysterious ship sailing the South Atlantic, he finds himself in a world of cut-throats, criminals and a captain strangely obsessed with Greek mythology. Accompanied only by the likes of Liverpool packet-rats and a spirited fiddle-playing female sailor, Mendick must do his duty and navigate his way to the truth.Who would go to such lengths to steal a steam yacht, and why?

Charley has always known that she's different - ever since she was small, strange things have happened around her - but it isn't until she meets high school heartthrob and the most popular kid in school, Aiden Cunningham, that she finally realises she isn't alone. Charley Chambers is magic. As Aiden begins to show Charley her full potential, she strikes up a friendship with the new kid, Marcus Gillespie. Marcus is dark, handsome and incredibly charismatic, but there is something odd about him, and Charley soon begins to realise that there might be more to him than meets the eye. Charley must learn who she can trust and who is out to deceive her. She knows one thing for certain, though. She will do absolutely anything to protect the people she cares about, even if it means destroying others in the process.

The runner-up on a TV elimination show is given a second chance, and sets out to steal the Scottish crown jewels. On top of all the official security, an ancient secret society exists to protect them, and a gripping tale develops, set in New York, Edinburgh and the Highlands. Who wins?

Steve Harvey was in the same class at school as Sting in the sixties, on 'the Fringe' with Liam Neeson in the seventies; spent a day with Spike Milligan; spent several months travelling round India by steam train; went round the world; taught on Tyneside; joined the police; breathalysed Gazza; was on the front line at 'the Battle of Orgreave' during the Miners' Strike (although he loathed Thatcherism); was appointed to set up his force's Paedophile Unit in the nineties; ran creative writing courses in an old mill with outbuildings he bought in Normandy with tutors including A L Kennedy; taught English as a volunteer in northern Iraq in 2004 (and visited Baghdad); ran the national Fatherhood Project in Scotland; was Safety & Security Officer for an international NGO in South Sudan; wrote a novel set in Africa; in 2010 travelled around New Zealand with his nineteen-year-old son for two months, working on farms and vineyards for our keep and then spent three months backpacking alone around South America; and he has been an extra in a BBC TV series and a Bollywood film too...This is the story of his life so far.

Mission-raised Ellie Amadi expects to live a dream life when she and her son Nat leave home in West Africa to join her white, estate factor, husband James in the Fife mining village of Hollyburn. In 1966 Fife, mixed marriages are unusual, never mind interracial ones, and Ellie soon witnesses the villagers' ignorance of outsiders. Ellie struggles to adapt to her new life and rebels against her husband's pressure on her to conform. When she is accused of neglecting her baby, and subjected to an allegation of witchcraft, Ellie questions her ability to go on living among white faces. The story draws on deep parallels between the cultures of West Africa and Scotland. Each chapter ends with a vernacular 'party line' telephone conversation between two village women, tracking the initial animosity towards Ellie and gradually, a grudging acceptance of her. When Nat is abducted by the school bully and nearly drowns, Ellie is stunned by the hostility she receives from an African male doctor. It is only then she realises that prejudice of incomers exists everywhere, and acceptance grows if nurtured by familiarity. This novel cleverly explores historical racial prejudice in Scotland and may raise some difficult cultural issues, perhaps still applicable 45 years later.

Guy Poynting's lover is dead and she has left 58 artworks that are increasing in price each day. Guy's mission is to satisfy his lover's last wishes and destroy all 58 pieces, before the last one can be sold for the most astronomical sum of all. Liska and Guy suspect that an artist cannot be considered truly great until he or she is dead. At least - some kind of suicidal statement would be just the thing to propel their work from obscurity into the infamous A-List of the art world. With their work completed, Liska and Guy attempt to immortalise themselves by following many of the greats to an early grave. Guy loses his courage however, and he's left alive and able to see how Liska's work is valued after her death. Set in contemporary galleries, studios and offices, The Studio Game portrays an art world in danger of imploding. The book makes light of how young artists struggle for recognition and discusses the contemporary art world's fascination for conceptual work. Popular works of art are referenced throughout, offering a running commentary on a story that is both a tale of young love and an insider's take on the eccentricities of our present-day art world.

After his nightmarish adventures in Mary King's Close in Crow Boy, Tom Afflick is drawn back to Edinburgh. At the National Museum of Scotland, he sees the eight tiny coffins that were discovered on Arthur's Seat in 1836 - one of the city's most intriguing mysteries. After a violent confrontation with his stepfather, Tom finds himself spinning back in time again, to the year 1828, where the peril comes not from bubonic plague but from a series of unexplained disappearances. Lost and confused, Tom seeks refuge in Tanner's Close as the guest of two of the city's most infamous inhabitants - But even two hundred years after the events of Crow Boy, he cannot escape the vengeful pursuit of bogus plague doctor, William McSweeny. Tom is soon caught up in a desperate struggle for survival - and the mystery of the tiny coffins is finally solved.

Last Train to Waverley is set in France in World War I, during one week in March 1918. The Germans launched their final major offensive of the war and pushed the British back thirty miles. One unit of the 20 Royal Scots were cut off. This book follows the fortunes of this unit, and the personal dilemmas of Douglas Ramsay, the officer in charge. Lieutenant Ramsay returns from hospital to the front line in March 1918. Before he has time to get to know his men, the Germans attack and break through the British lines. He is left in an isolated position with a handful of men. Most of his men are very young but he has two veterans in Sergeant Flockhart and Corporal McKim. Unfortunately Ramsay and Flockhart have a bad history, the details of which come out in a series of flashbacks throughout the book. Ramsay leads the survivors of the 20th Royal Scots back through the German lines to try and reach the always moving British positions. He is aided by Flockhart and McKim as he encounters various German formations on the way, including a crack Prussian platoon. As the Royals find their way back, the back stories of the sergeant and the officer are revealed through a series of flashbacks that show the social tensions and difference in lifestyles of the period. The book climaxes when Ramsay leads his men through the town of Albert in Picardy. The German advance slows as the soldiers loot the town. Ramsay's men reach the British lines and a machine gun ambush wipes out the Prussian Guards.

Following his debut collection, The Red Man Turns to Green, Dickson Telfer returns with this fresh offering of dark and comical short prose about everyday life. Join a 92-year-old man in his quest for peace. Place yourself in front of a class from hell. Be surprised by your home town. Discover the unsettling world behind the curtain of television. Look dead fish in the eye. Traipse your way through litter and text messages. Bark with joy. And don't let anything stop you enjoying refrigerator cake.

Connor Montrose is running for his life. All that he held dear has been ripped away. Every Western intelligence agency and all the police forces of Europe are looking for him, with orders to shoot on sight. The only man who can prove his innocence, is the man that most wants him dead. Only one woman, a Mossad sleeper in Paris, will stand by his side.With her help, he must now turn and fight. His journey of evasion and revenge take him from hidden Holocaust bank vaults in Zurich, to the stinking sewers of Paris and dust-choked souks of Morocco. Finally, in the back streets of Tehran, under the gaze of the Ayatollahs, he has the chance to end it, as it began. In blood. This gripping high concept thriller will delight fans of Lee Child and James Patterson.

This second thrilling volume of the Sun Song trilogy takes Sorlie to the floodlands of southern Esperaneo to discover that family, love and resilience can triumph against even the harshest regime. Escaping from the penal colony on Black Rock, Sorlie joins his grandmother Vanora's revolutionary army, expecting to find freedom. Instead he finds murder and mayhem. With her army in disarray and her network of supporters disappearing, Vanora chooses Sorlie to become her warrior.When Vanora is kidnapped, Sorlie becomes injured and marooned in the strange reservation of Steadie where old people and specials are hidden and protected from The State. But these outcasts are not the only secrets Steadie keeps. Why is Sorlie kept drugged for over a week? What are their links to The Blue Pearl Society? Why are they so wary of the Noiri black marketeers? And who is The Prince everyone is whispering about?The Sun Song trilogy explores life in a futuristic, post-apocalyptic Britain where society's norms have broken down and life has to be lived differently.

It's the year 2089 and everything is altered. The revolutions of the early 21st century have created a world divided - between the Privileged few and the Native (Celtic) underclass. Sorlie is enjoying a typical carefree Privileged teenage life until it is smashed apart by the cruel death of his parents and he is spirited away to live with his ice-cold grandfather at a mysterious island penal colony. Sorlie's discovery that the captives are being genetically altered to remove all trace of their Native origins triggers a chain of shocking events that reveal his grandfather's terrible secrets and, ultimately, the truth about himself.

Graham Morgan has an MBE for services to mental health, and helped to write the Scottish Mental Health (2003) Care and Treatment Act. This is the Act under which he is now detained. Graham's story addresses key issues around mental illness, a topic which is very much in the public sphere at the moment. However, it addresses mental illness from a perspective that is not heard frequently: that of those whose illness is so severe that they are subject to the Mental Health Act. Graham's is a positive story rooted in the natural world that Graham values greatly, which shows that, even with considerable barriers, people can work and lead responsible and independent lives; albeit with support from friends and mental health professionals. Graham does not gloss over or glamorise mental illness, instead he tries to show, despite the devastating impact mental illness can have both on those with the illness and those that are close to them, that people can live full and positive lives. A final chapter, bringing the reader up to date some years after Graham has been detained again, shows him living a fulfilling and productive life with his new family, coping with the symptoms that he still struggles to accept are an illness, and preparing to address the United Nations later in the year in his new role working with the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland.

"Langlands House is haunted, but not by the ghost you think."Augusta McAndrew lives on a remote Scottish estate with her grandmother, Rose. For her own safety, she hides from outsiders, as she has done her entire life. Visitors are few and far between - everyone knows that Langlands House is haunted. One day Rose goes out and never returns, leaving Augusta utterly alone.Then Tom McAllister arrives - good-looking and fascinating, but dangerous. What he has to tell her could tear her whole world apart. As Tom and Augusta become ever closer, they must face the question: is love enough to overcome the ghosts of the past? In the end, Langlands House and its inhabitants hold more secrets than they did in the beginning...

Sometimes it's terrifying, loving someone this much... For Fen Munro and her fiance James, it is a dream come true: an escape from London to a beautiful house in the stunning Perthshire countryside. Barr Dubh house is modern, a building with no past at all. But someone walks the grounds, always dressed in lavender. Under a lichenous stone in an abandoned graveyard, a hideous secret lies buried. And at night, Fen is tormented by horrifying dreams. Someone wants Fen's happiness, and nothing is going to stop them - not even death...

Meet Death, as you have never met her before. Even the Birds Grow Silent is a collection of narrative fragments told by Death herself. Death feels she gets a very bad press nowadays, and is keen to tell her side of the story. From singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen, to writer Virginia Woolf, to the tragic life of Lady Jane Grey, the Nine Days' Queen, Death has walked in their shadows and now, for the first time, shares her insights on them. She was there at the dawn of time, when the first cave paintings were created, and she will be with us until the end. However, she does have one final surprise up her sleeve...

Set in a brutal, chaotic Scotland of the near future, it's business at any cost for the people who live there. Archie Henderson, a passionate hunter, has rewilded his vast Highland estate filling the mountains and woods with wolves and bears. Here he runs wolf hunts with a terrible difference. But when a young man is killed by a bear on the reserve, Detective Inspector Rhona Ballantyne investigates. The death is not all it seems. She uncovers a terrifying truth that will put her own life in jeopardy. A new writer to this genre, Amanda Mitchison has hit the ground running with a new spin to Tartan Noir.

When a distillery owner's body is discovered on top of a remote Scottish mountain, forensics confirm that he died of natural causes. DI Corstophine's concerns are raised however, when the dead's man eccentric sister receives a message, apparently from the beyond the grave. The police are dismissive until it appears the devil himself is intent on attacking other family members. Why is his daughter kept locked and sedated in her room in the baronial mansion? Who or what is stalking his son as he scatters his father's ashes on lonely summits? And what insanity is behind the horrific attacks in their small Highland town? DI Corstophine and his team don't know what they're facing until it's too late. Following on from the success of Whirligig, The Devil's Cut is a story about what constitutes sanity and how delicate that state really is; how such a perfect emotion as love can completely destroy a man.

Edinburgh is basking in an unnaturally warm winter until the snow starts falling. When a student disappears, along with his climate research, and the national government close down all communications, Professor Finlay Hamilton realises there is a link between his own research into dark matter and the freak weather. Suddenly he is in a desperate race to save his wife, Jess, and their young family from a catastrophic event. His only help is a man from Jess's past, a past he never knew existed. Under the relentless snowfall, only the strong will survive - and Jess must be strong enough to keep her family safe.