THE BIG CHILL (Skelfs #2) by Doug Johnstone COVER REVEAL @doug_johnstone @OrendaBooks

It is an absolute honour to be revealing the cover for Doug Johnstone’s The Big Chill. Isn’t it FABULOUS? Don’t you just want to order it straight away? Out in e-book on June 20th and in paperback in August it’s an absolute MUST READ.

The Big Chill follows the critically acclaimed A Dark Matter, featuring three generations of women in the Skelfs family … funeral directors and part-time private investigators…

The Big Chill Reboots the classic PI novel while asking the big existential questions … all with a dose of pitch-black humour and hair-raising tension

· The Skelfs series has been optioned for TV by Blazing Griffin

The Skelfs are back…

So what’s The Big Chill about? Here’s what the blurb says…

Haunted by their past, the Skelf women are hoping for a quieter life. But running both a funeral directors’ and a private investigation business means trouble is never far away, and when a car crashes into the open grave at a funeral Dorothy is conducting, she can’t help looking into the dead driver’s shadowy life.

While Dorothy uncovers a dark truth at the heart of Edinburgh society, her daughter Jenny and granddaughter Hannah have their own struggles. Jenny’s ex-husband Craig is making plans that could shatter the Skelf women’s lives, and the increasingly obsessive Hannah has formed a friendship with an elderly professor that is fast turning deadly.

But something even more sinister emerges when a drumming student of Dorothy’s disappears and suspicion falls on her parents. The Skelf women find themselves immersed in an unbearable darkness – but could the real threat be to themselves?

You can pre-order The Big Chill in e-book and paperback now, so clickety-click!
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Doug Johnstone is an author, journalist and musician based in Edinburgh. He’s had eight novels published, most recently Fault Lines. His previous novel, The Jump, was a finalist for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year. Several of his other novels have been award winners and bestsellers, and he’s had short stories published in numerous anthologies and literary magazines.

His work has been praised by the likes of Ian Rankin, Val McDermid and Irvine Welsh. Several of his novels have been optioned for film and television. Doug is also a Royal Literary Fund Consultant Fellow. He’s worked as an RLF Fellow at Queen Margaret University, taught creative writing at Strathclyde University and William Purves Funeral Directors. He mentors and assesses manuscripts for The Literary Consultancy and regularly tutors at Moniack Mhor writing retreat. Doug has released seven albums in various bands, and is the drummer for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers, a band of crime writers. He also reviews books for The Big Issue magazine, is player-manager for Scotland Writers Football Club and has a PhD in nuclear physics.