Condition Purple — Peter Turnbull

In Glasgow one summer evening a frightened young woman in heels is walking. Click. Click. Click.

The man who will kill her when he sees her is in the city. She knows this because she has seen his car cruising in the grid system, and she knows he knows where to find her because she stands every evening in an alley off Blythswood Street. The woman is just twenty-one years old. It is her death that will trigger P Division's latest investigation.

She was found at l0.00 pm, the knife still in her throat. She was a heroin addict and had the words `I belong to Dino' tattooed on her groin. They were the only clues. Yet as the police interviewed anyone in any way connected with her, combed the area, collated evidence, they began to build up a picture of the dead girl, her associates, family, lifestyle, which led to the arrest of a vicious murderer who had killed and would kill again.

Marked by growing tension and a chilling awareness of the evil that preys on those who inhabit the lower levels of a great city, Peter Turnbull's latest police procedural views with compassion the roles of policemen and victims alike.