DOUG JOHNSTONE

THE Skelfs are three generations of women who take over a funeral director’s and a private investigator’s business in Edinburgh when the patriarch of the family dies. Now the head of the family, matriarch Dorothy,

70, is trying to find a way forward through her grief. She was raised in California but has lived in Edinburgh for 50 years, plays drums and has a hippy outlook on the world. Her daughter Jenny is 45, divorced and jobless and she moves back into the family home. She’s jaded and cynical, but gradually grows closer to her mum. Her daughter Hannah, 20, studies physics and struggles with her mental health. They look out for each other, bury the dead, care for the bereaved and solve mysteries that crop up. Starting from book one,A Dark Matter, I’ve thrown loads of my own experience into the three women, from Dorothy’s drumming to Hannah’s physics to Jenny’s Gen X attitude.

I was also writer in residence at a funeral director’s, which was partly my inspiration. But really the Skelfs books are about how we relate across generations and how we connect to each other.

●●Doug Johnstone’s new Skelfs book, The Great Silence, is published by Orenda on August 19