Mortal Causes cover art

Mortal Causes

 Preview
Get this deal Try Premium Plus free
Offer ends 29 January 2026 at 11:59PM GMT.
Prime members: New to Audible? Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Just £0.99/mo for your first 3 months of Audible.
1 bestseller or new release per month—yours to keep.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, podcasts, and Originals.
Auto-renews at £8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Mortal Causes

By: Ian Rankin
Narrated by: James Macpherson
Get this deal Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly. Offer ends 29 January 2026 at 11:59PM GMT.

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

LIMITED TIME OFFER | £0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Premium Plus auto-renews at £8.99/mo after 3 months. Terms apply.

About this listen

It is August in Edinburgh and the Festival is in full swing... A brutally tortured body is discovered in one of the city's ancient subterranean streets and marks on the corpse cause Rebus to suspect the involvement of sectarian activists. The prospect of a terrorist atrocity in a city heaving with tourists is almost unthinkable. When the victim turns out to be the son of a notorious gangster, Rebus realises he is sitting atop a volcano of mayhem - and it's just about to erupt.

©1995 Ian Rankin (P)2011 Orion Publishing Group Limited Crime Thrillers Fiction Mystery Police Procedural Thriller Thriller & Suspense Traditional Detectives Crime Detective Suspense

Listeners also enjoyed...

 Rebus cover art
The Rise cover art
The Murderer's Son cover art
A Litter of Bones: A Scottish Crime Thriller cover art
Grimm Up North cover art
The Engine House: A Black Beacons Murder Mystery cover art
The Turning of Our Bones cover art
The Bonnie Dead cover art
A Long Time Dead cover art
The Hope That Kills cover art
Silent Tide cover art
Cold Granite cover art
Murphy's Revenge cover art
Ash and Bone cover art
Divorcing Jack cover art
A Lethal Frost cover art
All stars
Most relevant
Mortal Causes starts with the gruesome discovery of a corpse in a long-buried street in Edinburgh during the Festival. It’s the beginning of an investigation that brings Rebus into close contact not only with the conventional underworld - including Rebus’s old
sparring partner, gangster Big Ger Cafferty - but also with the world of the Troubles. Bomb threats and bodies multiply, while Rebus’s love life is, as ever, complicated. Siobhan does appear, but we don’t see much of her. The dramatic opening of the novel sets the tone for the rest of the novel and its climactic scenes, set amid the bustle of the Festival (which Rebus loathes) … That sense of drama and immediacy is probably the book’s strongest attribute. The story hangs together well. The cast of characters is relatively long and can be a bit confusing. But the plot moves along at a good pace. Some of the accents are a bit dodgy, including a Cockney Special Branch copper and Cafferty, whose baritone, gravelly tones I always find a little OTT… Overall narrator Macpherson does a fine job. I’ve been listening to the Rebus titles in order over the last couple of years. The dialogue-heavy narrative works really well on Audible. Mortal Causes is perhaps the most rounded of the novels so far. The strands of the plot are drawn together expertly. Rebus is beginning to find his feet in Mortal Causes - it’s a relatively easy, satisfying and fast-paced listen. It also reinforces a theme that will remain predominant throughout the series - the duality of Edinburgh, a city with a dark side.

Rebus in mortal danger

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

What made the experience of listening to Mortal Causes the most enjoyable?

James Patterson is a wonderful narrator and makes the story credible

What was one of the most memorable moments of Mortal Causes?

The pace of the plot is unrelenting although deceptive

Have you listened to any of James Macpherson’s other performances? How does this one compare?

Yes and he is Rebus - no-one else reads Rankin like Macpherson

Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

It did both - the characterisation in the writing and the strength of the reading - excellent

Any additional comments?

All round good read

Ian Rankin

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great Scottish crime fiction. Expertly narrated, with a compelling leading man. Buy it. Buy the whole set.

Great as usual

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Outstanding as always bill narration and super story great pace n prose Qx xxx. Xxxx. X. Great stuff

Brill

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I love Rebus and Rankin full stop, but whether it's a good or bad thing I always wish they were longer. I guess I'm just greedy. well worth the time to get into them though, and try them chronologically of you can.

great series, too short

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews