Mondays Book Talk - The Black House

Written by Ben Kesp

The Black House by Peter May

The Black House by Peter May is a captivating story and one I enjoyed reading. May was born in Glasgow and began his writing career as a journalist for The Scotsman and the Glasgow Evening Times.  His first book ‘The Reporter’ was published when he was 26 years old. May was asked to adapt the book for the BBC and left journalism and wrote full time for television. May has written many successful drama series and his novels have won him prestigious awards like the Prix des Lecteurs (readers’ prise). 

The Black House is the first book in ‘The Lewis Trilogy’ and was first published in France and won the French national literature award in October 2011. The story follows Detective Inspector Fin Macleod who is sent from Edinburgh to the Isle of Lewis (Hebrides, Scotland) to investigate a brutal killing. For Fin Macleod returning to the Isle of Lewis is more than a murder investigation, it is a journey into his childhood, a past that he has ran away from many years earlier. The story is dark and everything about the remoteness and bleakness of Lewis and its inhabitants amplifies this even down to the great detail used by May in describing the cold, harsh weather that ravages the island and the power of the Atlantic that shows no mercy. 

The Black House is more than a crime novel and be prepared for this. It is a coming of age story about a young boy growing up enduring the hardships in the harshness of the Isle of Lewis with many unresolved and dormant issues. Well developed characters and story lines give this a good read. 

The following two books in the trilogy are The Lewis Man published in January 2012 and The Chessman published in January 2013.