Long Day Monday: A Glasgow P Division Procedural

The urban wastelands of industrial Glasgow, Scotland's largest city, are bared mercilessly once again in this latest potent procedural from the author of Fair Friday and Two Way Cut . Turnbull's compelling vision rivals the narrative firepower of John Harvey ( Rough Treatment ) and fellow Glaswegian William McIllvanney ( Strange Loyalties ). Twenty-five years separate the discoveries of two abandoned cars; each was carefully parked and a stuffed toy rabbit was found close by. The first came at the start of copper Ray Sussock's career, the second close to its end, when Sussock is punching the clock, waiting out his time on the force and rebounding from a painful divorce. But unbeknownst to Sussock, the two cars stand close to shallow graves, marking brutal child murders that represent only two of a serial killer's many crimes. In a brief tale suffused with suffering, Turnbull depicts the timid and battered wife of an eyewitness, the distraught mother of a missing boy, a starving child waiting for death and two prostitutes battling booze and heroin. While none of the police of Glasgow's P Division is a saint in the city, they are indelibly touched by the emotional and physical harshness of the terrain they traverse day by day. An outstanding series. (Mar.)