Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for this eARC.

A Winter Grave is an atmospheric thriller set in Scotland in 2051.

In this story climate change has wreaked havoc on the world and a mysterious murder case unfolds in the Highlands.

Peter May masterfully blends the genres of crime, science fiction, and family drama, creating a compelling and complex story that explores the themes of survival, secrets, and redemption.

The novel follows Cameron Brodie, a veteran Glasgow detective who volunteers to investigate the death of George Younger, an investigative reporter whose body is found encased in ice on a mountain top near Kinlochleven. Brodie has a personal stake in the case, as he hopes to reconnect with his estranged daughter who lives in the remote village where the investigation will take place.

Along with pathologist Dr. Sita Roy, Brodie uncovers a web of lies and corruption that puts them in grave danger.

As a snowstorm cuts off their communication and escape, Brodie must face his past and a ruthless killer who will stop at nothing to murder Brodie and Roy.

May’s writing is rich and vivid, creating a sense of place and atmosphere that immerses the reader in the harsh and bleak landscape of the Scottish Highlands. He also paints a realistic and disturbing picture of the near-future, where global warming has caused sea levels to rise, crops to fail, and wars to erupt. The novel raises important questions about the consequences of human actions and the responsibility of the media and the government to inform and protect the public.

The characters are well-developed and believable, each with their own flaws and motivations. Brodie is a sympathetic and relatable protagonist, who struggles with his health, his guilt, and his love for his daughter. Roy is a smart and courageous partner, who helps Brodie unravel the mystery and confront his demons. Younger is a fascinating and enigmatic figure, whose investigations reveal a shocking truth that could change the world.

The plot is fast-paced and suspenseful, with twists and turns that keep the reader guessing until the end. The novel is also well-researched and detailed, incorporating scientific and historical facts that add credibility and depth to the story. The novel is a standalone, but it also references some of May’s previous works, such as the Lewis Trilogy and the Enzo Files, which will delight his fans.

A Winter Grave is a captivating and thought-provoking thriller that showcases Peter May’s talent and versatility as a writer. It is a novel that will appeal to fans of crime, science fiction, and drama, as well as to anyone who enjoys a well-written and engaging story. It is a novel that will make you think, feel, and wonder about the future.

I am NOT typically a major fan of sci-fi mixed with crime fiction, but this was a good read despite my initial resistance (I requested this book because I enjoy this author's work - I must have overlooked the sci-fi connection).

Please give this book a read if you enjoy mystery with a futuristic dystopian twist.

A Winter Grave is a thriller mystery set in the (relatively) near future in Scotland written by Peter May. Released 24th Jan 2023 by Hachette on their Riverrun imprint, it's 368 pages and is available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats. Paperback format due out from the same publisher in first quarter 2024. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links throughout. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

Peter May is a nearly peerless writer. He has impressive skill with a range of settings and stories. He does brooding and imperfect protagonists -very- well. This standalone sees him adding near-future climate dystopia to the mix. Set in the Scottish Highlands, climate change has rendered much of the earth flooded, uninhabitable, barren, or just frozen (when the Gulf Stream changed course a few decades before the book's setting in 2051). A meteorologist checking a weather station discovers the body of a journalist, frozen in the ice.

This is a gloomy book. Decades of inaction over climate change have wrecked the planet and fundamentally changed climate and weather; many of the earth's inhabitants are displaced and seeking asylum. Unfortunately, crime doesn't stop just because everything's out of control. In addition, protagonist Brodie is haunted by his own life choices and being forced to face his own mortality sooner rather than later.

Throughout everything, May's creative control and writing chops come through clearly. He is a wonderful writer and his prose here is commanding. Some readers will likely complain that there's too much "politics" involved, but the author's take on the timeline we're hurtling along is on the optimistic side.

Well written, engaging, and solidly researched, albeit gloomy. Recommended for fans of the author's oeuvre, as well as fans of tartan noir in general. It's not Laidlaw, but it's not far off, either.

Four and a half stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.
I love books set in Scotland. Always a great setting for a crime thriller.
I’ve enjoyed other novels by Peter May and this was no exception.

A Winter Grave is a dystopian thriller novel by bestselling author, Peter May. The novel starts with a young girl checking out her weather instruments at the top of a mountain and finds a frozen body. Cameron Brodie is a detective who doesn’t like doing things the modern way, and is disciplined and made to go into a snow filled village to solve a murder.

It is difficult to understand the positive hype to this strange dystopian novel with futuristic contraptions; the time spent on them is b-o-r-i-n-g. When the author mentioned things that have happened since today, and includes the decades old farce of climate change, and leftist garbage, it was time to move on to another novel and stop reading this one.

Although the first chapter of the novel draws attention, the next chapters are slow and it takes forever to get into the actual storyline. Many readers (me included) will quickly lose interest. While many critics love Peter May’s writing, this critic thinks it is a waste of time and chooses to skip his novels. Because this novel takes place in the future, it lacks the charm that the setting would generally evoke. The writing isn’t good, either; one gets the feeling that May sits at his typewriter with a thesaurus.

All told, this is a novel for Peter May’s diehard fans, and readers new to his novels will most likely skip them if this one is anything like is previous novels. It may be helpful to read one of his previous novels to see if they are better.


Special thanks to NetGalley for supplying a review copy of this book.

I have read and enjoyed a number of Peter May's novel. However, I found that I did not enjoy A Winter Grave. I found the main character to be uninteresting...even somewhat annoying. The plotline did not seem strong enough, or interesting enough, to justify the time investment. If you read for enjoyment, or simply entertainment, I think this may not be your best choice.

Once again, Peter May has returned to Scotland with a complex novel that combines climate apocalyptic changes, murder mystery and a domestic situation that has left a policeman’s relationship with his daughter severed for the past 10 years. As the story begins, we are in the year 2051, in a very altered Scotland and a very altered world. While the equatorial world is now too hot to sustain life, Scotland has become a country divided between rain and blizzards. Coastal areas are gone. Travel is by new evolved methods that go limited distances. But crime still exists.

Detective Inspector Cameron Brodie has a lot on his mind when asked to volunteer to travel to the West Highlands to investigate a body found in the ice, to establish whether a crime had been committed. He knows his estranged daughter, Addie, lives in the area too. Initially reluctant, he eventually does go which begins the reader’s initiation into possibilities of future travel and its dangers. It also leads to flashbacks into Brodie’s earlier life and family. We learn his family’s background.

While initially these threads may have felt a bit disparate, they came to flow well together for me, filling in aspects of the story as and when needed for the sake of all the characters involved. May is expert at creating settings of all kinds, here majestic, beautiful, threatening, and deadly. He also can devise plots that are complex but are not overdone. He cares about his characters and makes them human. The three stories, of climate, of crime, of family, work out along side each other, though the climate story really hasn’t worked out at all!

Rating 4 to 4.5*

Thanks to Quercus and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in return for an honest review.

It’s hard to resist a police procedural set in a harsh, inaccessible setting, where the investigation is rendered so much more complicated by the inherent difficulty of gathering evidence. This crime scene is practically apocalyptic: a remote mountain village snowed in for the winter, with body that required a team of mountaineers to extract from the ice. Detective Cameron Brodie has the climbing skills to be the logical choice to travel to the village and investigate the murder, and he has personal motives both for getting out of Dodge and for heading to this particular area. The story takes place in 2051, when climate change has drastically altered weather patterns and human settlements worldwide. There’s nifty technology for detecting ubiquitous deepfakes, autonomously flying helicopters, and instant on-site DNA analysis gadgetry. This idea is clever but takes a while to introduce; for a few chapters I was worried that the book was going to end up spending too much time preaching about the perils of climate change and not actually getting to the mystery. It’s worth sticking with it, though. Once the story gets going, it’s compelling and fast-moving, with dangerous criminals on the loose and added drama from the perils of the setting and also from deep family tensions. The futuristic details are sprinkled more sparingly and to occasionally amusing effect: used Teslas being dumpy cars for people who can’t afford better, and SD cards with multi-terabyte capacities.

Thanks to Netgalley and Hachette for a digital advance review copy.

This book, while set in the future speaks about the very real possibility of climate change. Throw that into an remote, desolate and hostile environment like Scotland and mix in an intelligent, elusive serial killer and you've got this masterpiece. It'll have you flying through the pages!

Set in 2051 Scotland. A neglected planet is its own crime scene of climate devastation and murder. Dealing with freezing temperatures, ice storms, avalanches and blizzards, protagonist Cameron Brody sets off to investigate the death of an investigative reporter and reconnect with his daughter; two challenges in the midst of the impossible and impassible storms. The plot is filled with adventure and non- stop action. The characters are authentic and relatable. A Winter Grave is a standalone and another Peter May book going on my excellent read shelf. Five stars. Thanks to Netgalley and publisher for this ARC of A Winter Grave, it is truly a must-read.

May takes your typical British police procedural and combines it with sci-fi, and comes up with something unexpected. A procedural set in the future but dealing with the same corruption and greed that inflitrates the modern British force,and adds in a bit of suspenseful thriller, to not only keep you on edge and rapidly turning the pages.brodie will make you rethinkwhat family means and about the bonds between parent and child. This is a book not to miss if you love mysteries!

Set a little bit into the future, when rising seas have flooded coastal cities and put parts of Edinburgh and Glasgow underwater, a detective gets bad news: not only is his life crummy, he has cancer and only six months to live. When the opportunity arises to travel west to a highland village where a missing investigative journalist has been found, frozen in an ice cave high up on a mountain, he decides to offer to investigate. An avid climber, he's scaled most of Scotland's peaks. But more importantly, the person who discovered the body is his estranged daughter, an environmental activist who hasn't spoken to him since her mother committed suicide. He has things he wants to say to her before it's too late.

Though the book starts out with a dark and gloomy tone, the story picks up speed and energy as we travel to Peter May territory, where the pacey plot is paired with a natural setting that's austere, dangerous, and beautiful. The focus is more on the mystery than on the futuristic time frame, but there's enough attention paid to the environmental, social, and technological changes to make for a plausible backdrop (though one wonders if there will be investigative journalists around to be murdered). Those familiar with the places he describes will be intrigued and likely horrified by the future he predicts. One criticism: the main character's relationships are painted with a bit of a broad brush, but that won't stop readers from turning the pages once the story takes off.

Peter May is a must read author for me and I was so glad to be given this Arc to review. A remarkable and enjoyable dark and eerily twisty novel. One of his best!

Having read many books by Peter May over the years and reviewed several https://www.jackreidy.com/blog/tag/peter-may/, I was sure this book would definitely be worth reading. And I was not disappointed.


I started reading Peter May with the Lewis Trilogy after a friend told me I might enjoy them. That was about 6 years back and since then I ‘ve read several more. I’d like to thank Netgalley for a chance to read and review A Winter Grave by Peter May before publication. The book is scheduled to be published on January 19.

This is a complex mystery set in the near future with flashbacks to give the history behind the events. We first met Addie in 2051 as she climbs a mountain in the Highlands of Scotland. We also meet our first dead body on that climb. The body is encased in ice on the mountain and it looks like a murder. Then we switch to the Glasgow of 2051 which is largely underwater and meet DI Cameron Brodie.

Climate change and rising oceans have caused major problems around the world. And Scotland is no exception, most airports and other low-lying regions are under water. Coastal roads and railroads are unusable. Much transportation is dependent on small aircraft that can land on small areas. For reasons explained in the book, DI Brodie goes to investigate.

There are considerable problems in getting to the site. No one knows why the dead man was there. More problems due to severe weather, a nuclear power plant, and Brodie’s relationship with Addie add tp the mix. Peter May moves skillfully between this dystopian future and events explaining the personal relationships and events that contributed to these problems.

Since the book is set in Scotland and the author is a Scot, it seems appropriate to add a link to a book review by the Scotsman
https://www.scotsman.com/arts-and-culture/books/book-review-a-winter-grave-by-peter-may-3983413

Peter May is a Scottish writer I have enjoyed since 2018 when The Black House came out, but in this outing with a new detective and a new time setting to 2051, May has written a “climate fiction” novel that is more thriller than mystery perhaps. And I enjoyed it immensely. Our Glascow detective, who you find out early has been given only a few months to live, volunteers to go to the west coast of Scotland –which 30 years from now is under ice and snow due to the melting of the ice sheets and the end of the Gulf Stream flowing warm water past the British Isles. Much of the thrill in the novel concerns our heroes attempts to survive the elements, unpiloted drones, and rolling electric blackouts, while trying to find out who killed the reporter encased in ice on the hillside near the Isle of Mull.

The future does not bode well for humanity in May’s novel after man’s reckless mishandling of our planet. One quarter of the Earth’s people are displaced by famine, weather emergencies and war over them both.

For years now authors have had to invent new ways to make a thriller/mystery work with the troublesome advent of cell phones and other technology that renders a victim able to call for help or look up solutions on the computer. Many have taken us back to the past so that cell phones and computers are not an issue to the plot. While other writers have put their characters on an island/boat/underground/ or somewhere remote so that potential victims cannot just call out when killers arrive.

Now, it seems that authors are moving the plot lines into the future where weather catastrophes and technology failures are common and killers can once again “get away with it” enough to warrant a story. This outing by May takes place only 30 years from now, and yet unpiloted drone planes seem believable. And also terrifying. This futuristic novel is a complete mystery and thriller alike. A delightful read even though I was horrified at the future May paints for our planet. A great page-turner. 4 of 5 stars
This ARC title was provided by Netgalley.com at no cost, and I am providing an unbiased review. A Winter Grave published Jan. 24, 2023.

It’s November 2051 and the world has changed. Not for the better. Climate change and the resultant rising oceans have eaten up entire countries (India), states (Florida) and cities (London). Deteriorating conditions in Africa and Asia have sent massive numbers of unwanted immigrants to Southwestern Europe leading to protests, discrimination and violence. Cold regions are colder longer and hot regions hotter. Some things never change, however, so when Addie Sinclair discovers a body frozen in the ice in remote Kinlochleven, Scotland, Glasgow DI Cameron Brodie volunteers to investigate. There are many reasons for this, the main one being that his estranged daughter Addie studies weather patterns there. The small town has a hotel, a helipad/football field, one policeman and few residents since completion of a nuclear power plant nearby. Brodie is surprised that no one knows why the dead man was there. He has barely begun his investigation when dead bodies begin to pile up as fast as the snow drifts.

Peter May moves skillfully between Cameron Brodie’s troubled life in 2023 and a dystopian future in A Winter Grave. Brodie is a deeply flawed yet sympathetic character and his daughter Addie shines with emotion and bravery. The plot is as detailed as I expect from the gifted Peter May. I hope his vision of the future never becomes reality. 5 stars.

Thank you to NetGalley, Hachette Book Group and Peter May for this ARC.

*4.5 stars rounded up. Brrr! Bring out the hot chocolate and afghan and turn up the heat for this chill-inducing thriller! A Winter Grave is set in the Scotland of 2051 where the effects of climate change we've been warned about have become a reality. Many parts of the world are underwater or so hot as to be uninhabitable and the world's population is on the move.

But here in Scotland, a body has been found frozen in the ice near Loch Leven, that of one Charles Younger, an investigative journalist with the Scottish Herald who had been reported missing three months earlier, and Detective Inspector Cameron Brodie volunteers to travel there along with the doctor who will do the post mortem, Dr Sita Roy.

Cameron has personal reasons for wanting to take on the case and his backstory is revealed in flashbacks that begin in 2021. Here is a man haunted by his past.

This is my second book by Peter May and both have been excellent! The characters are so well-portrayed with all their human flaws. The mystery is intriguing with nicely-placed shocks as the story unfolds. The setting is so much a part of the story, making it so atmospheric. This was a thrill, from start to finish.

I received an arc from the author and publisher via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and the opinions expressed are my own. I highly recommend this standalone thriller.

I want to thank NetGalley and the publisher, Quercus Editions Ltd, for letting me read and review an advanced copy of ‘A Winter Grave’ by Peter May.

Set in the year 2051, after climate change has dramatically altered the earth, we are introduced to DI Cameron Brodie of Glasgow, Scotland, who is being sent to a remote town to investigate a suspicious death of a reporter. The body, encased in an icy snow tunnel, was found high on a mountain by a young woman who needed to service a weather station. Actually, Brodie volunteers to go for two reasons; he is facing a personal medical crisis, and he needs to reconnect with his estranged daughter.

When Brodie and Dr Sita Roy arrive at the town on a pilotless electric helicopter, they find only darkness, as there is a blackout due to a storm. At that point they still do not realize that their lives are also in peril, as they try to investigate the reporter’s death.

The story was very engaging as May describes the efforts of Bodie, Roy, and Robbie the local policeman, as they try to survive the elements and the situation. I did think that there would have been more scientific advances, based on the setting in 2051, but the interaction of the characters was quite intriguing.

When I saw that this novel was set in the year 2051, I wasn't so sure about it because I hardly ever read futuristic, dystopian-type books, but I'm certainly glad that I stuck with it. A fast-paced, tight thriller (with a high body count), this standalone from Peter May offers a potential glimpse at our not-so-distant future with commentary on climate change, technology and politics. The story alternates between "the past" of 2023 and "the present" of 2051. COVID is still hanging around in 2051, along with extreme cold and heat, and never-ending rain and flooding, but crime, drugs and murder are still hanging around, too. May does a great job of introducing and fleshing out his characters, even in a novel that moves fairly quickly. This one was hard to put down and will give you a lot to think about as well.

Call this 4.5 stars. I received an ARC of this from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Set 30 years in the future, after climate change has well and truly changed the shape of the world, Inspector Brady is sent to the far north of Scotland to investigate a body found in an ice tunnel. Brady knows he should not be investigating this case as he has dark secrets of his own, and reminders of it are waiting in the small village on the loch.

The book is a tiny bit preachy when it comes to climate change, but it's a small enough part of the story that it should not bother readers who don't happen to agree with the message (I do). As with most May mysteries, it is extremely well written with just the right amount of plot twists. Highy recommended.

303 pages

5 stars

This book is set in 2051. All I can say is “no thanks.” to the future. I was amused to see that cockroaches survive global warming. I read once where they would survive a nuclear winter.

The bottom line in this book is Mr. May’s warning that humankind is destroying the planet.

Aside from that, there is a cracking good story about a murder, a despondent detective named Cameron Brodie and his estranged daughter Addie.

Addie is a meteorologist in a small village in Scotland. The village is beset by snow and ice, much different than it used to be. While checking her weather stations, she discovers a body frozen in the ice. It is the body of a news reporter. What was he doing in the area?

Detective Inspector Cameron Brodie is joined by pathologist Dr. Sita Roy. They fly north of Glasgow to the village. They meet the local policeman named Bobby. Bobby is Addie’s husband. During the necropsy of the reporter, Dr. Roy learns that he has been murdered.

Addie is shocked to see that her father is handling the case. They have been at odds for ten years. Addie believes that her mother committed suicide because of Cameron’s cheating.

So begins an active and driven investigation to learn what happened to the reporter. More murders occur, ratcheting up the tension in the story.

The end of this story is fast paced and shocking.

I have been reading Mr. May’s books for years and have rarely been disappointed, and then not very much. His talent is obvious. I truly enjoy reading his books and will continue to do so. I am very much afraid that his underlying message is already coming true. The weather has become more extreme all over the world.

I want to thank NetGalley and Hachette Book Group for forwarding to me a copy of this wonderful book for me to read, enjoy and review. The opinions expressed in this review are solely my own.