Malice in the Highlands (Erskine Powell Mysteries)

The hoary idea of the urban detective who finds himself hip deep in murder while on holiday in an exotic locale is given fresh new life by Graham Thomas in his first mystery about New Scotland Yard Murder Squad's detective chief superintendent Erskine Powell. Powell is an original and very interesting copper, and the site he chooses for his abortive vacation--the salmon fisherman's paradise of Cairngorm Water, along Scotland's River Spey, "stained dark with peat and lashed to a yeasty foam, looking like brown ale"--is so beautifully described that you can smell it. Even when it turns out that there are more human bodies than salmon floating in the water, Thomas manages to keep Powell from snagging his line.