The Field of Blood

Paddy Meehan is a young, ambitious woman striving to become a journalist in 1981, Glasgow.

What I love about Denise Mina is that her characters are awfully human, the complexity of their flaws and strengths being the foundation of her books. It's a raw and realistic presentation of a rough, criminal scene.

I love Mina's Alex Morrow series. This one, the Paddy Meehan series is written earlier and it shows (it's not as ‘‘polished', not that I mind). Where Alex Morrow is a Detective Inspector (also in Glasgow), Paddy Meehan brings a different filter, adding more layers to the social commentary: Ambition and duty suddenly have different meanings depending whose eyes you perceive with.