Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Meet the author: SG MacLean on new novel The Bookseller Of Inverness

© Ewen WeatherspoonSG MacLean
SG MacLean

It began a decade ago in the gallery of Leakey’s Bookshop in Inverness, where historical-thriller author Shona MacLean had stopped for coffee.

On the table was a card. She remembers: “It said this was the site of the old Gaelic Church where Jacobite prisoners had been kept in horrendous conditions after the battle of Culloden in 1746 – before they were shot at the old High Church next door where the bullet marks can still be seen.”

According to the card, the soldiers’ souls haunt their erstwhile prison. “The idea that the ghosts of the Jacobite prisoners were still there lodged in my head,” says MacLean. “So I wrote a short story about a Jacobite bookseller. That was 10 years ago. It didn’t come to anything but it stayed in the back of my head.”

When lockdown hit in 2020 the story came rushing to the fore. And what she was to write was to take her back to her own roots and those of her famous uncle – the late, great Alistair MacLean, who penned classics such as Where Eagles Dare and The Guns Of Navarone that made the silver screen. More than that, it was to result in the first standalone novel from the twice CWA award-winning author of The Seeker and The Alexander Seaton Series.

The Bookseller Of Inverness is the mum of four’s 10th novel. It pitches the reader into the world of grumpy bookseller Iain MacGillivray. A Culloden veteran, he is trying to get on with life when a stranger comes to his shop on a mysterious mission and winds up dead.

MacLean, 56, who has a doctorate in 16th and 17th Century Scottish history, says: “I wanted to do something set around my home and my own history.”

The writer, who lives near Inverness with her husband James Vance, head teacher of Culloden Academy, says: “The first time I went to Culloden was with my dad when I was 13. My father had been born close to where the battle was fought.”

There were four boys in the family – Lachlan, followed by Ian, then Alastair, and Gilleasbuig, her father. Growing up in the 1920s and 30s idyll that was Strathnairn, their Gaelic scholar father, minister at nearby Daviot, would not allow English to be spoken. MacLean says: “They lived in the manse where and read voraciously – Robert Louis Stevenson and Walter Scott – they went fishing, and earned pocket money beating for grouse shooters.

“But when their father died they had to move to Glasgow. A year or so later their oldest brother Lachlan, who was a medical student in Glasgow, died of cancer. And then they were straight into the war. But there was a golden glow about all these boys in Strathnairn before the tragedy happened.

“The character in my book thinks about his youth in Strathnairn. I only realised when I was writing the book there was a parallel to what I felt about my dad’s childhood.”

MacLean knew her famous uncle well, even though he had left Scotland for the balmy glitz of Cannes and Dubrovnik. The man she describes as generous and humorous with a dry wit, encouraged her writing. But he died in Germany in 1987 before he could see her published.

She says: “I liked writing when I was a child and he asked me to write him a short story. I did but when I went on holiday to see him a few weeks later in Dubrovnik he didn’t ask for it and I didn’t show it to him because I was too embarrassed. He never did see it.”

Its subject? She smiles: “I had written a Jacobite story.”


SG MacLean The Bookseller Of Inverness, Quercus, £16.99