The setting is bleak in a Scottish industrial slum where a nine year old boy elects to remain mute after witnessing murder, torture, and drug abuse. He helps a strange woman with golden eyes escape from the ropes which bind her to the underside of a couch and together they flee into the Highlands. There an odd group assembles to protect them both. She and her oddly scarred mother, a quiet but lethal silent man and a dog. They wait.

Who do they await? Who do they flee? There are many questions in this story which slowly reveals its plot but one worth the wait. As the relationship between Detective Inspector Orla McLeod and Jamie the mute little boy develops, we learn of her tragic past and bits of his. She carries scars both physical and mental of a twenty-five year old tragedy which has ramifications even today.

How can they trust? Who can we as readers trust? To say more will give away some of this tense story of highs and lows both geographic and dramatic. If you like movies such as The Long Good Friday or the more recent Snatch with its eclectic characters and plot twists then No Good Deed is the book for you.

--Jane Davis