Interview with Craig Robertson

CRAIG ROBERTSON stood by the frozen Lake of Menteith in the harshest of winters as workers drilled bore holes to test the depth of the ice and thought: 'I wonder if you could fit a body through that hole.'

It would have been no surprise had he rung the Royal Caledonian Club for more information, such is the creativity utilised by the serial killer in Craig's Simon & Schuster-published debut novel Random. After all, we are talking about a character who takes pure liquid nicotine in one hand, an inhaler in the other, and fashions a deadly weapon.

Glasgow is being terrorised by The Cutter. Police are stumped. There's seemingly no rhyme, no reason and no motive to the murders. All that connects them is the killer's calling card - a finger snipped from each of the victims, delicately placed in an envelope and posted to police and journalists.

"He chooses his victims at random by various means then clinically bumps them off in ways designed to attract the attention of the media," says Craig. "All is not, inevitably, as it seems and there an ultimate method to his madness. En route he unwittingly also attracts the attention of a Glasgow gangster as well as a dogged cop and his plans start to unravel."

The dogged cop is Detective Sergeant Rachel Narey. While Craig originally considered telling the tale from her point of view, he instead found it "worryingly easy" to get inside The Cutter's head. "I had actually written a few chapters with DS Narey as the main character and I also had a go at alternating chapters with the killer, the cop and the gangster telling the story but it just didn't work," he says. "When I decided to do the whole thing in first person from the killer then I knew it was right. Although it did mean that I had to do the entire book thinking as a serial killer.

"I was trying to do something a bit different and wanted to avoid the 'police procedural' route. Not that there is anything remotely wrong with that. I enjoy reading procedurals but just didn't want to write one. I also wanted to get inside the killer's head and try to get a handle on his motivations and thought processes."

That he certainly did. Random delivers a dark and sinister portrayal of a meticulous man on the edge, an insight into the effects of loss and loneliness, which complements the stable thriller diet of blood, guts and gore. This is NOT for the squeamish.

Craig says: "I wasn't necessarily trying to engender sympathy because it's hard to argue that a serial killer could ever merit any.

"But I'd have to own up to trying to mess with the reader's perception of him. I was working on the basis that no-one is all bad and that if the reader sympathises with him then that's their own lookout. If I did generate empathy then it was by 'being' him and he clearly doesn't see himself as being at fault for what happens."

Craig, from Stirling, took to fiction with 20 years' experience as a journalist with Scottish national newspaper The Sunday Post under his belt, in a career that's put him on the scene at major stories including 9/11, the Dunblane massacre and the Madeleine McCann disappearance. The Cutter's account is interspersed with newspaper clippings. Unlike most attempts at this in crime novels, Craig's background ensures they are well and professionally written. It also meant the task of hitting word counts and deadlines and the intricate research Random benefits from was no problem. Just another day at the office.

"Being a journalist did make that easier than it might have been," he says. "I bought so many books on murder and murderers from Waterstone's that I'm sure they must have had me on some kind of watch list for the police. You can't beat the internet though for instant knowledge - or the at least being able to give the impression of it."

He turned to fiction five years ago, but put the book down for a couple of years after going through what he describes, with understatement, as "a bad time in his life". That was the death of his wife, Jacquie, to whom Random is dedicated. When he picked it back up, it led to a two-book deal. Random was released on April 1 ("I was glad when midday passed and I was sure it wasn't some elaborate hoax.") to positive reviews.

Craig is part of the new 'Tartan Noir' generation. That Scottish crime-writing conveyer belt is showing no signs of slowing down. "I'm sure that ability to reach the darker side of the human psyche is in all of us but Scots do seem to be better at doing it than most," he says. "We live in what is a relatively violent and aggressive culture fuelled by alcohol, ginger genes and too much rain and the obvious thing is to write about what's around you. Many Scots also have a fondness for black humour that lends itself well to crime writing.

"There's probably a bit of chicken and egg about it too. Seeing the success of other Scottish crime writers is a real confidence booster to think 'Yes, I could do that too'."