WHEN THE NEEDLE DROPS.

It's the run-up to Christmas, 1998. On the Isle of Mull, Sergeant Ivor Punch is losing himself in his vinyl collection, a tragic anniversary and too much single malt whisky. But news of a missing child soon brings him back to his senses. And as word spreads of more strange disappearances, an aircraft vanishing from the sky and a famous classical musician gone with it, it seems a sinister plot holds the island in its grip. Punch thought he knew the secrets of this place, its people and stories. Yet as a grisly trail of effigies and clues are discovered, he struggles to untangle past mysteries and find out what's really happening right under his nose. And time is fast running out for the policeman that locals call 'The Clock'. The first book in The Mull Mysteries Series from multi-award-winning musician, producer, author and playwright, Colin MacIntyre. PRAISE FOR COLIN MACINTYRE 'A storyteller with a unique imagination and clarity of style' - THE SCOTSMAN The Isle of Mull, three days before Christmas, 1998. Sergeant Ivor Punch is contacted by a frantic caller, Maggie May, about a missing pilot and plane. Respected classical musician Xander Lowry has vanished without a trace after taking off, impromptu and alone, in a Cessna Needle from the airfield of a local hotel.For Punch, this strange incident takes places on the tenth anniversary of the Lockerbie disaster, in which his brother was killed. Now aged 45, Punch is a loner who slaughters sheep to unwind and survives on a diet of whisky and The Faces vinyls, and the last thing he needs is to be reminded of the past.Then Lowry's body is found, propped up on a hillside - but no plane in sight. To make matters even more frustrating, Punch - more used to employing the amateur sleuth-like services of local accomplices Randy, a musician-come-forestry-worker, and the island's gothic undertaker, Dave the Grave - must entertain an overly-keen and bureaucratic new deputy, PC Cluny, despatched from Head Office. A little girl, Iris, goes missing, and soon after another body is found.And now effigies start appearing around the island - of Punch, Lowry, Iris, Charlie and others. A sinister plot is unfolding, holding the island in its grip, and all the evidence starts to point back to the start - to the elusive Maggie May and that first phone call to Sergeant Punch . . .