Are you missing Line of Duty? If so, this should keep you happy for a few hours,. Max Craigie has moved from London to work for Police Scotland. He is ex services and fought in Afghanistan. He has PTSD and terrible nightmares and is on a trial separation from his wife because of this.

The novel opens with a chilling scene. A gangster, dying of lung cancer, visits a graveyard in the Highlands and disappears. Reluctantly his family seek police assistance. Max and his partner Janie discover his body under a gravestone. This opens the biggest can of worms ever. Before long the gangster's family, appropriately named Hardie, have had several people killed in revenge. Worse it becomes clear that their vengeance is being aided by police officers within Police Scotland. Stopped from doing his job, Max goes rogue and soon uncovers corruption at the highest level. Hastings would be in his element!

I loved this book and am delighted that it looks to be the first in a series. Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the ARC.

A solid debut novel. Engaging characters, a well written, fast paced storyline and a good dose of Scottish humour combine well in what I hope is the first in a new series.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and author for this ARC.

This is the first book I’ve read by Neil Lancaster and I began reading not knowing what to expect. The description of the book looked interesting and sounded like my kind of read. It definitely was. I loved this book, absolutely loved it. It started off really well and grabbed my attention right from the start and held it all the way through. I really liked the main character Max Craigie, he was so very believable with a good back story. He begins a missing person enquiry that ends up as a murder investigation and the consequences from this investigation reach far and wide. The book is about historic family feuds, revenge, police corruption, organised crime and is told through different characters which I loved. The moments of humour between Max and a work colleague were light hearted and very funny. I thought this was a very well written book which flowed really, really well. It had a great plot, it was fast paced, thrilling, full of lots of action and had so many twists in it ..... I had many ‘wow’ moments when reading. The author certainly knows how to write a great story, then ramp up the tension and suspense .... the second half of the book had me on the edge of my seat. This has got to be one of my best reads so far this year and one which really hit the mark. I’ve looked at the authors other books and will read them when I can, and I really hope there will be a second book featuring DS Max Craigie.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and would recommend it highly. Good characters, great plot and excellent writing. Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for giving me an advance copy of this book to read.

I don't know if Neil Lancaster has been in the police service in real life , but this title had me gripped from the start!
Without giving any spoilers , all I can say is read the book as it is just so brilliant , in fact it's so good , it's terrifying !
Looking forward to the next title .

An interesting read about an ancient feud between gang families based in Scotland however there was no real big twists that shocked me which I was hoping for.
A pretty cliche crime fiction including bent coppers

I thorough enjoyed this book. The characters were very believable and I even found myself reading with a Scottish accent haha. It tells the story of two families feud that dates back years. It comes to a head when the patriarch gets killed in a graveyard and his sons try and eliminate everyone from the other family. There’s lots of police corruption and who can Max trust. He sticks with Janie which is a fantastic choice. The corruption goes really high and other police forces are called in.
One comment about the layout of the book. I didn’t think there was enough separation between paragraphs/chapters. The words just ran on and I didn’t realise we’d moved to a different place or it was different people speaking. Other than that I couldn’t fault it.

This grave can never be opened!

Who, what, when, why??

This gripped me from the very first page, a family feud dating back to 1800s.

I love this type of thriller, I loved the concept of the plot, the characters even the shady ones.

I enjoyed reading this more than I thought I would I will definitely be reading more from Neil in the future.

An exciting Scottish police procedural, this grips from the start. The authentic sounding investigations revolve around gang warfare with historical connections. Max, our hero, has returned to Police Scotland after a stint in the Met and soon gets caught up in the action after a missing person enquiry turns into a nail-biting chase to put away local villains and bent coppers.
Max, of course has issues, but they don’t hold up the action very much. A good read , especially for fans of Stuart McBride. Thanks NetGalley for letting me have a review copy.

Fast paced, suitably gory in places with a really meaty storyline which was really easy to get engrossed in. I absolutely loved this book, from the stunning scenery and backdrops in Scotland to the carefully and cleverly crafted characters and the fantastic descriptions and history that we find out between them.
There was plenty of action including immaculately written fight scenes and acts of violence and it was definitely edge of the seat stuff. I thought the way the story panned out was very clever and beautifully planned and I felt very engaged with the main characters who were very likeable.
Some strong themes such as police corruption, criminal underworlds with very violent undertones etc but it worked really well. I’m definitely going to look up more titles by this author

When I read this book was being released I was disappointed… but only because I enjoyed the Going trilogy so much and had hoped for more of the characters that Neil Lancaster created and that I completely invested in, my disappointment was both short lived and completely unnecessary as this book creates characters I have again been utterly subsumed by and whom I want to read more, I have already preordered this book on Audible so I can enjoy it again soon

Trust me when I say that this book is going to be a big hit. It was a brilliant, fast paced thriller of a ride. I felt as though I was on a rollercoaster reading this book as there are lots of twists and turns, some that are unexpected too. I felt as though I wanted to be there in the thick of it and I didn't know how the story was going to pan out, I just wanted to keep on reading till the end. It was such a good storyline which is set in Scotland, a body has been found in a ancient grave, there is a blood feud going on between two families, is this part of the feud? and how many more people will die before the feud ends? can the police that are investigating stop it before it is too late? I wanted it to end so I could find out how the story would end but I didn't want it to end as I really enjoyed it. I would highly recommend this book.

When a Scottish gangster goes missing, Max is asked to look into it. Taking Janie along, a cop who no one wants to work with, the pair balance each other out well. Max is a cop, with no ties of corruption, so is a perfect one to investigate. Good story, and hard to put down. Would highly recommend.

Neil Lancaster writes a thrilling piece of Scottish crime fiction that just grabs you right from the start and never once lets go. It is the first in a series that features DS Max Craigie, an ex-military man who served in Afghanistan, suffering PTSD, plagued by horrifying nightmares, who has left the London Met after questions arose after a shooting incident. His wife, Katie, has not yet decided whether she wants to follow him up to Scotland and is taking time to consider her decision. Max is based in Gartcosh, and with the fast tracked DC Janie Calder, find himself at a bleak, isolated, abandoned graveyard at Ballachy, opening a grave with the inscription that it should never be opened. Given what occurs, the horrific body count that follows this act, Craigie is to find himself wondering if it would not been better if that grave had been left well alone, as he finds himself in grave danger and shunned by Police Scotland.

In the grave is the recently missing Tam 'Peeler' Hardie, the elderly head of Scotland's biggest crime family, controlling and distributing heroin and cocaine from their Glasgow base. He has been killed with a 200 year old cutlass, as part of a blood feud that goes back to the 19th century, from its beginnings in 1930. Tam Jnr, as the eldest of Hardie's 3 sons, is the new head of their criminal empire, with his brothers, Frankie and Davie as the enforcers. Intent on addressing any misapprehensions that they have been weakened by the murder of their father, the powerful and ruthless Tam Jnr chillingly demonstrates that this is not the case, and is not to be deflected from pursuing a monstrous bloody retribution for the death of his father, despite Police Scotland's quick arrest of the killer, a man with mental health issues.

As Craigie investigates and asks questions of the deaths that follow, he finds himself stymied and caught up in a scary level of police corruption that appears to run deep in the police force. Craigie, however, is a determined man. This is a fast paced, enjoyable and exciting crime read that is hard to let go of, it is engaging and entertaining, and I loved both main characters. Craigie finds both friendship and invaluable help from Janie, a strong and independent woman to be reckoned with. Whilst, as is often the case, you will have to suspend your sense of disbelief on occasions, this is a wonderful addition to the Scottish crime fiction genre and I look forward to encountering DS Max Craigie in his next case. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.

Dead Man's Grave by Neil Lancaster was intense and exciting. Thank you Netgalley for the advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. Tom Hardie Sr. finds a grave with the words "This Grave Never to be Opened." There were no names or dates on the stone. Tom walked through braken, gorse, and briars to find this place. DS Max Craigie worked in London, then moved to Scotland. This book grabbed me right from the beginning and didn't let go. I really enjoyed it.

This is one the best books I have read in a long time. Neil Lancaster is a new author for me, but I will certainly be reading more of his books as I really enjoyed this one.. Recommend.

The first in the DS Max Craigie Scottish crime thriller series. I’ll be on the look out for more titles by this author. A steady pace, nothing slow and nothing rushed. Perfect!
I loved this book and recommend as a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I found the opening of this book very atmospheric. An old crime boss visits the grave of a very old relative. It says "this grave can never be opened" on the grave stone. However, when the crime boss disappears and his family (also hard core villains) ask the police for help, the grave is opened. DS Max Craigie is the policeman who is involved. He has only recently returned to Scotland from England and has some issues from his time there. Will Scotland bring him any peace... When Max reports to the sons of the crime boss about his findings they don't seem surprised by any of the news. Could they have possibly found out before Max saw them and if so how?

Initially I thought this was maybe a fairly conventional cop story. "Cop" with a history coming to a new force, working with an interesting new female officer - I wondered whether this was really my sort of book. The story follows Max during his investigations. Increasingly I found parts entertainingly unconventional or dark and well worked. It seemed that my initial judgement was off the mark here.

The characters are maybe not the strongest part of this story though Max is good. I also liked the character of Janie too who acts as his partner in this story. For me it was the pace and inventiveness of the storylines that got to me. It was a book I returned to whenever I had any time free and times I read for far longer than I intended. The more I read of this the more I got into it and enjoyed it.

In a sense this is as much an action thriller/suspense story as an ordinary cop story. While this comment will date think "Line of Duty" but with a much better ending rather than anything else! In the end I found a book that I was not expecting at lot from initially very enjoyable. Personally I will read another by Neil Lancaster and I would definitely want to read the next in this series. 4.5/5

This is an absolutely brilliant book. Beginning with a murder in a remote graveyard, the plot gets increasingly complex with gangland retribution and corruption in the police force. The main characters are likeable with their own personalities and back stories. I cannot recommend it highly enough, and I can’t wait for the next novel from Neil Lancaster.

Thanks to net galley, the publisher, and the author for allowing me to read and review this book.

DS Max Craigie is sent to a remote Scottish cemetery looking for a missing person, who just happens to be the head of a major crime family. Along with a partner, PC Janie Calder, they quickly track down the body of the man, and they also find the killer. With a change at the head of the crime family, a wave of retribution is unleashed, and and Max and Janie set out to bring the criminal empire down, as well as a number of crooked cops.

This was a great story and I look forward to reading more books by this author.