Fault Lines

By Doug Johnstone

When volcanologist Surtsey finds her married lover dead, she pockets his phone and makes the fatal decision to keep her discovery secret … but someone has been watching…

‘A cracking and highly original thriller’ Mark Billingham

‘You don’t read Fault Lines so much as you white-knuckle your way through its twists and turns’ Megan Abbott

‘A superb, highly original psychological chiller’ Steve Cavanagh

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In a reimagined contemporary Edinburgh, where a tectonic fault has opened up to produce a new volcano in the Firth of Forth, and where tremors are an everyday occurrence, volcanologist Surtsey makes a shocking discovery. 

On a clandestine trip to new volcanic island The Inch, to meet Tom, her lover and her boss, she finds his lifeless body, and makes the fatal decision to keep their affair, and her discovery, a secret.

Desperate to know how he died, but also terrified she’ll be exposed, Surtsey’s life quickly spirals into a nightmare when someone makes contact – someone who claims to know what she’s done…

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‘An explosive thriller’ Daily Record

‘A cracking-good thriller with some seriously good writing and some beautifully designed characters … Here’s a writer pushing the thriller envelope, giving the reader not just a good novel, but also a unique one’ David Pitt, Booklist

‘Novel and elegant … it is the book’s thought-provoking and heart-breaking moments that carry the reader through the story and which resonate most at the end’ Scotsman

‘Both a meditation on the volatility of human nature and a gripping thriller with plenty of twists and turns … An original and addictive thriller, as intelligent as it is shocking’ Foreword Reviews

‘Richly characterised, beautifully crafted, this is a book that you truly inhabit’ Emma Kavanagh

‘Scotland’s truest exponent of noir’ Chris Brookmyre

'A subtly off-kilter speculative thriller that builds to a truly explosive ending’ Eva Dolan

‘A pacey, gripping read’ Louise Voss

‘Sexy, fearless and addictive’ Helen FitzGerald

‘Johnstone weaves his compelling and original tale with great skill and elegance from the gripping beginning to a tense and explosive ending' Amanda Jennings

‘Brilliantly unputdownable’ Martyn Waites

‘Superb’ Luca Veste

‘Blending powerful imagination and plotting, this is the work of a writer at the top of his game’ Stuart Neville

‘Plays with every single emotion’ Susi Holliday

‘This had me hooked from the first page’ Cass Green

‘Poignant, gripping and packed with seismic shocks’ Paddy Magrane

‘Incisive, intelligent and imaginative’ Michael J. Malone

‘I was completely swept away’ Caroline Mitchell

‘Hits you lie a seismic shock’ Douglas Skelton

‘Grabs you by the throat in the first chapter’ Neil Broadfoot

• Language: English
• Publisher: ORENDA BOOKS
• Release date: Mar 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781912374168

Doug Johnstone

Doug Johnstone is the author of Twelve novels, most recently The Great Silence, the third in the Skelfs series, which has been optioned for TV. In 2021, The Big Chill, the second in the series, was longlisted for the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. In 2020, A Dark Matter, the first in the series, was shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year and the Capital Crime Amazon Publishing Independent Voice Book of the Year award. Black Hearts (Book four), will be published in 2022. Several of his books have been bestsellers and award winners, and his work has been praised by the likes of Val McDermid, Irvine Welsh and Ian Rankin. He’s taught creative writing and been writer in residence at various institutions, and has been an arts journalist for twenty years. Doug is a songwriter and musician with five albums and three EPs released, and he plays drums for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers, a band of crime writers. He’s also player-manager of the Scotland Writers Football Club. He lives in Edinburgh.

Reviews for Fault Lines

[jess_reads_books · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A tectonic plate has opened up in the Firth of Forth, outside of Edinburgh. This change has caused daily tremors to be felt throughout the nearby towns and created a volcanic island, known as The Inch. This island is a source of intrigue for the local geologists and volcanologists. Surtsey is one of those volcanologists. She is studying and working towards her PhD with a small group of fellow students under the direction of Tom Lawrie. One night Surtsey takes a trip out to The Inch to meet Tom, who is not just her boss, but also her lover. When she gets there she finds him lifeless on the beach with his head smashed in. In order to keep her private life private Surtsey lies to the police about their relationship and her whereabouts that night. Things quickly spiral out of control. On top of being unable to stop the police from seeing her as a suspect, Surtsey must also face the reality that her mother is dying. Can Surtsey balance a deteriorating personal life while trying to prove she’s not a murderer? Who really killed Tom?Doug Johnstone creates a captivating work of crime fiction in FAULT LINES. The reader tags along with suspect number one, Surtsey, as she fumbles through an attempt to cover up her relationship with a now murdered married man. Her lies to the police about her whereabouts the night of Tom’s death quickly sweep her on to the list of possible murderers and leaves the reader begging her to tell the truth. In addition to the murder investigation, Surtsey must also come to terms with her mother’s nearing death and the impact this has on her relationship with her sister. Johnstone is able to weave together these dominating plot lines in Surtsey’s life and create a seamless story. FAULT LINES is filled with edge of your seat moments, heartbreak, and the possibilities that can spiral from telling a lie. Thank you so much to Orenda Books and Doug Johnstone for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. Thank you to the fabulous Anne Cater for setting up another #teamorenda tour full of fantastic bloggers! Please be sure to check out the rest of the blogs showcasing FAULT LINES on its blog tour!

[nicx27 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I wasn't completely certain what to expect from Fault Lines but it intrigued me so much, and given that I'd heard some great things about it, I knew I wanted to give it a go. I wasn't disappointed, in fact I loved this book.Surtsey McKenzie lives in Edinburgh. But this is not Edinburgh as we know it. In this Edinburgh there is a volcanic island in the Firth of Forth called The Inch. Surtsey is part of a volcanology team studying the island and one day she discovers the body of her lover, Tom, there. This sets in motion a chain of events in which Surtsey finds herself lurching from one shocking event to another.This is such a clever and engrossing read. The different, but so similar, landscape is fascinating and the idea that there could be a volcanic island in the UK and earthquakes happening all the time is a little freaky. I think what worked so well for me was that it was so plausible in that it was worked into the story as just part of everyday life, something that the locals saw every day. Then there's Surtsey, with the fabulous name (she was named after an Icelandic volcanic island). She's mid-20s, pretty difficult to like, prickly and as volatile as a volcano, and yet I did rather like her. She's very strong, very confident and I liked that about her. I didn't take to any of the characters particularly, but I don't care about that and don't need to like characters when the story is so strong and so well plotted.Fault Lines is a thriller and a murder mystery. It really did thrill me. It is a short read at 215 pages and I shot through it. Short chapters helped as it was always a case of just one more, just another one. I was so drawn into the suspense and needed to know what was going to happen.The ending was a real wow ending. Not something I was expecting to happen at all, (although perhaps I should have) and a very imaginative way to round up one particular character's role. I thoroughly enjoyed my time reading this imaginative and intense story.