From Ian Rankin to Ann Cleeves to John Harvey and newcomers Brian McGilloway and Harry Bingham, Great Britain is presently awash with a flood of good quality crime writers and their fictional police detective alter egos. Many of them, such as Rankin’s Inspector Rebus and Cleeves’ Chief Inspector Vera Stanhope, have also made their way successfully to the small screen, and in recent years they have been joined by Mark Billingham’s prickly London detective Tom Thorne, who has also featured on television. Since his first appearance in 2001 Thorne has developed into a complex, flawed character and Billingham’s plotting has also improved over the course of the series. The Bones Beneath is the twelfth book in the series and once more finds Billingham and Thorne in good form.

Thorne was close to being sacked after the events of the last book, The Dying Hours, but instead of dismissal he is reinstated to the Murder Squad. The reason for this reversal of fortune is because Thorne is needed for a very special task, to oversee a prisoner escort operation to locate a buried body that a serial killer has owned up to several years after his imprisonment.

Thorne has been specifically requested by the killer, Stuart Nicklin, a manipulative monster  put away by Thorne some 10 years ago. Nicklin has agreed to lead the authorities to a body he buried on the small remote island of Bardsey off the coast of Wales. The authorities want closure for the family of the victim, but Thorne suspects that Nicklin is up to something: ‘‘I’m telling you ... it is a wind-up’’.

Accompanying Thorne is a small team of prison guards and forensic experts and another prisoner that Nicklin has brought as his witness. Once on the island the team discover more bodies than they expect and the tension ramps up when they get cut off from the mainland by a storm.

The contrivance of Thorne’s reinstatement and the mission to the island, which occurs with an unlikely low level of security, is easily overshadowed by Billingham’s fine writing and his ability to define characters and situations with a few terse words of exchanged dialogue and black humour. As usual, the plotting is solid and Billingham instils a sense of mystery and uncertainty from the opening page.

The pacing is leisurely to begin with, but speeds up once the team reaches the island. The undulating Welsh countryside and the unpredictable coastal weather make a nice change from the usual London setting and the book builds to a good final twist.

An enjoyable police novel and a fine addition to the series.