A book I wanted to like a whole lot more than I ended up doing, I'm sorry to say. The plot is fairly pedestrian, the writing is rather labored, and the germ of a good idea here can't quite manage to get through the muddle. Some interesting characters and a great setting, but I was hoping for more. ( )

An art appraiser, disgraced for reasons unknown, has been sent by the government from London to Edinburgh to assess the authenticity of a painting which a wealthy family plans to give to a public art museum in exchange for a multi-million pound tax break. Oddly enough, the family keeps making it difficult for him to actually see the work in question. Meanwhile, an artist has been gruesomely murdered, and an old-school reporter for a broadsheet that is on the ropes is pursuing the story.

Thomas Tallis, the art specialist (whose father also works for the government as a spook) is a troubled man who would like to be with his young son but keeps doing self-destructive things while leaving unanswered messages on his father's phone. The reader wants to grab him by the lapels and give him a good shake. Shona, the reporter (and her elderly father, retired from the paper and spending his days mucking in an allotment) is a grumpy, dogged, also somewhat self-destructive but much more appealing protagonist. There's a detective who is smart and interesting, but we're never let in on why he wears a lot of makeup.

I have mixed feelings about this book. The solution to the mystery is fairly obvious, the metaphors and descriptions are a bit of a muddle, but there are some striking aspects to the ways the story unfolds, the Edinburgh setting (the Goldenacre is a neighborhood of the city), and the cheering way that both main characters stand up for their professional judgment in spite of the obstacles in front of them. Three stars for the labored adjectives and descriptions and the imbalance of style over plot, four for Shona and the discussions of art when Tallis can be bothered.