The Big Chill

Physics, music, funerals, and private investigators – a strange assortment of nouns you’d think to all prominently feature in one book. But for the Skelf family of Edinburgh, it’s a concoction fit for their unusual lives where drama is always lurking.

A Dark Matter welcomed the first instalment of the Skelf series and its sophomore follows on from where it left off. Lead by three generations of the Skelf family, Dorothy (gran), Jenny (mum), and Hannah (daughter), the different age narratives offer anecdotes for readers of all ages to relate to.

All of the main features of the Skelf’s lives are actually inspired by author Johnstone’s own experiences and achievements. As well as having a degree in physics, Doug is also a musician and songwriter, a former writer in residence with a funeral directors, and of course a crime writer.

Opening with a car crash into an open grave at a funeral that Dorothy is conducting, her family’s hopes for a quieter life feel ever more like a distant dream as she can’t help but look into the dead driver’s shadowy life.

While Jenny and Hannah also find themselves caught up in their own struggles, the concurrent narrative to the The Big Chill lies in the family’s past coming back to haunt them in the form of Jenny’s murderous ex-husband Craig. After the dramatic events that concluded A Dark Matter, which saw lives lost, Craig sits behind bars facing charges for his crimes. But little do the Skelfs know that Craig is slowly exercising his manipulative mind to get his own back on the family once and for all.

In the midst of Craig’s haunting chill and of the Skelf’s work as funeral directors, enough wry humour is peppered throughout to lift the plot’s sombre tones. Moreover, the Skelfs’ familiarity and professionalism with death in their line of work is somewhat therapeutic in realising that compassion ultimately remains during some of the most harrowing times for us.

Finally, one of the core undertones to this book, and perhaps its main lasting feature, is its Scottishness; its depictions of Edinburgh’s culture, its blunt Scottish humour, and the defiance exemplified by the characters create a story that is relatable despite the Skelfs’ peculiarity.

Review by Jamie Wilde.