The Complaints
| Company type | Novel |
|---|---|
| Industry | Literature |
| Founded | September 3, 2009 |
| Founder | Ian Rankin |
| Products | Crime novel |
The Complaints is a crime novel penned by Scottish author Ian Rankin, released in the United Kingdom on 3 September 2009.
Plot outline
Detective Inspector Malcolm Fox serves within the Complaints and Conduct Division of Lothian and Borders Police, a unit often met with distrust by frontline officers. Fox and his colleagues launch an inquiry into Detective Sergeant Jamie Breck, who is suspected of connections to a child pornography network. Concurrently, Breck investigates the suspicious death of Vince Faulkner, a man who had an abusive history with Fox’s sister. This personal link prompts Fox to question his official duties, leading him to intervene in the Faulkner case despite breaching protocol. Tensions escalate with Breck’s commanding officer, who opposes Fox’s scrutiny of a corrupt subordinate.
Both Fox and Breck face suspension, with Fox subjected to an internal probe. Undeterred, they persist in examining Faulkner’s demise, uncovering associations with a failed property developer who apparently took his own life. Their findings reveal connections to organized crime and implicate a high-ranking police official responsible for framing Breck and targeting Fox.
Structure and relationship to the Rebus novels
Set between February 3 and 24, 2009, The Complaints employs dated sections throughout the narrative, a stylistic choice also utilized in Rankin’s earlier Rebus novels The Naming of the Dead and Exit Music. The timeline embeds the story within the consequences of the 2007-2008 Great Recession, which impacted Scotland’s banking sector, real estate market, and criminal activity.
Rankin offers a richly detailed portrayal of Edinburgh, incorporating actual police stations, precincts, and ranks to maintain consistency with the Rebus series. Although the Complaints and Conduct office appears in Rebus books, this novel introduces no recurring characters from those stories; for instance, Mullen is absent. DI Shug Davidson is replaced by "Bad Billy" Giles at Torphichen station, while underworld figure Jack Broughton operates independently from Rebus’s adversary "Big Ger" Cafferty. Additionally, while Siobhan Clarke alludes to reporting a duplicitous constable to Complaints at the conclusion of Exit Music, that incident is not revisited here.
The narrative includes only a subtle reference to John Rebus: Fox recalls an officer who refused promotion in order to undermine a rival—mirroring an event involving Rebus in Let it Bleed (1996).