\"The poster in Patel's general store announces: \"Do you want to be a famous writer? Famous writer John Heppel will help you become one.\" Lanky, red-haired Hamish Macbeth thinks no one will sign up even though Heppel wrote for a popular TV soap opera. The canny Macbeth is wrong. The desire to be published burns as brightly among Scots as do their hopes of appearing on the telly. Over a dozen budding authors show up at the village hall - and once Heppel mocks their writing and butchers their dreams, every single one of them wants to kill the arrogant little man.\" \"Then someone does. Worse, many of Macbeth's neighbors - even the spinster twins, Jessie and Nessie Currie - have motive, means, and opportunity. Worst of all, this high-profile crime brings the media and Macbeth's new boss, Detective Chief Inspector Heather Meikle, to Lochdubh. And to Macbeth's dismay, the whisky-drinking, man-eating Heather soon sets her cap for the bachelor constable himself.\" \"Desperate times call for desperate measures. With his trusty dog, Lugs, tagging along, Macbeth must search for a way to exonerate his friends and uncover the real killer. Not entirely by coincidence, the path leads him to former girlfriend Elspeth Grant, now at a city newspaper. But romance for Macbeth sputters like a peat fire in the hearth: It will take a might blow to get it glowing. Instead, something unexpected will howl down the loch like a cold wind...leading Macbeth to danger and a surprising encounter, one that may change his life and batter his heart.\"--BOOK JACKET.