White nights by Ann Cleeves

It's midsummer in Shetland, the time of the white nights, when birds sing at midnight and the sun never sets.
Artist Bella Sinclair throws a party to launch an exhibition of her work and to introduce the paintings of Fran Hunter. The Herring House, the gallery where the exhibition is held, is on the beach at Biddista, in the remote north west of the island. When a mysterious Englishman bursts into tears and claims not to know who he is or where he's come from, the evening ends in farce. The following day the Englishman is found hanging from a rafter in a boathouse on the jetty, a clown's mask on his face.
Detective Jimmy Perez is convinced that this is a local murder. A second murder Biddista only reinforces this belief. But the detective's relationship with Fran Hunter clouds his judgement. And this is a crazy time of the year when night blurs into day and nothing is quite as it seems.


White Nights was the Saturday Play on Radio 4 on Saturday 2nd July, 2.30 pm, directed by Kirsteen Cameron. and starring Steven Robertson as Jimmy Perez. Ann was particularly pleased with this casting: "This is great news" she said, "because Steven is a Shetlander." The play received a seasonal repeat on the evening of 9th June 2012.

The production also featured music by Shetland fiddler Chris Stout, who collaborated with harpist Catriona McKay to produce a CD aslso called - "White Nights"! Ann Cleeves explains: "It's not a representation of the book, rather a sense of Shetland and Scandanavia in mid-summer. But there is one tune called Roddy Sinclair - the name of a charismatic fiddle player who appears in the book!"
More about White Nights, the album, on Chris Stout's web site.
Find the locations described in White Nights on a map of Shetland, or read a review of White Nights in the Wheredunnit blog, with a focus on the scenes of the crime.
A short video of Ann Cleeves talking about White Nights.


Thanks to Ann Cleeve's website,  www.anncleeves.com