Glasgow author Denise Mina’s résumé is packed with awards and accolades and, whether it’s one of her three acclaimed series or her inventive stand-alones like The Long Drop, there’s overwhelming evidence that Mina is crime writing royalty. Her latest novel underlines her versatile talents: a zesty tale imbued with up-to-the-minute issues.

Anna McDonald lives a domestic existence with her lawyer husband and two daughters, a safe life masking her troubled past and very public trauma. Now living under a new identity, Anna’s lukewarm reality is upturned when her husband leaves, and she learns from a true crime podcast that an old acquaintance is dead. Even worse, a powerful woman from Anna’s past who made her life hell could be involved.

Anna becomes obsessed with the podcast and starts picking at the case of a luxury yacht that sank in the Mediterranean, finding an unlikely ally in the form of the anorexic ex of her former best friend. Pandora’s Box opened, together they follow a trail from the Highlands to Europe, hunting for some sort of truth while visiting the hideaways of the rich and the wretched and trying to stay ahead of some very dangerous people.

There’s a real verve to Mina’s storytelling, which blends gut-punch moments with great characterisation, a clever structure, and some nice touches of black humour. Conviction fair hurtles along and is one of those smile-inducing books even as it’s full of dark deeds.

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson