The Beat Goes On (short story collection)
| Company type | Book |
|---|---|
| Industry | Publishing |
| Founded | 2014 |
| Founder | Ian Rankin |
| Products | Short story collection |
The Beat Goes On: The Complete Rebus Short Stories compiles all 30 short stories featuring Inspector Rebus by Scottish crime novelist Ian Rankin, along with the novella Death Is Not the End. Notably, it does not include the Rebus tale "Well Shot" from 2nd Culprit (1993). This volume represents Rankin's third anthology of short fiction.
History
Initially released in 2014, the paperback version published in 2015 incorporated two additional stories missing from the hardcover: the newly penned "Cinders," created for Christmas 2014, and "My Shopping Day," originally found in Herbert in Motion and Other Stories (1997).
The collection begins with "Dead and Buried," which takes place in the mid-1980s, during the early stages of Rebus's police service. "The Very Last Drop," set shortly after Rebus’s retirement as depicted in Exit Music, was composed for a charity function held at Edinburgh's Caledonian Brewery benefiting Royal Blind.
Included are all twelve Rebus stories from A Good Hanging and Other Stories, portraying a year in Rebus’s life with significant entries such as "Playback," "A Good Hanging," and "Auld Lang Syne." The seven Rebus narratives from Beggars Banquet are also present, alongside six previously uncollected short stories published in magazines and newspapers, many themed around Christmas. The anthology is completed by two fresh tales, "The Passenger" and "A Three-Pint Problem."
Within the preface and the essay titled "Rankin on Rebus" (pages 595–609), Rankin offers insights into his experience crafting the character. Copyright for works up to approximately 1997 remains with Ian Rankin; subsequent rights are held by John Rebus Limited.
Stories labeled "AGH" first appeared in A Good Hanging and Other Stories (1992), whereas those marked "BB" were included in Beggars Banquet (2002), though originally published elsewhere.
List of featured short stories:
%}References
| Year | Title | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 2013 | "Dead and Buried" | |
| 1990 | "Playback" | |
| 1992 | "The Dean Curse" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Being Frank" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Concrete Evidence" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Seeing Things" | AGH |
| 1992 | "A Good Hanging" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Tit For Tat" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Not Provan" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Sunday" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Auld Lang Syne" | AGH |
| 1992 | "The Gentlemen's Club" | AGH |
| 1992 | "Monstrous Trumpet" | AGH |
| 1997 | "My Shopping Day" | |
| 1991 | "Talk Show" | BB |
| 1992 | "Trip Trap" | BB |
| 1993 | "Castle Dangerous" | BB |
| 1992 | "In The Frame" | BB |
| 1994 | "Facing The Music" | BB |
| 1995 | "Window of Opportunity" | BB |
| 1998 | "Death Is Not the End" | BB |
| 2000 | "No Sanity Clause" | BB |
| 2003 | "Tell Me Who to Kill" | |
| 2002 | "Saint Nicked" | |
| 2005 | "Atonement" | |
| 2005 | "Not Just Another Saturday" | |
| 2010 | "Penalty Clause" | |
| 2014 | "The Passenger" | |
| 2014 | "A Three-Pint Problem" | |
| 2010 | "The Very Last Drop" | |
| 2014 | "Cinders" |