A Mass for the Dead: A Muirteach MacPhee Mystery

Scotland 1373: Crispinus the head of Oronsay Priory is found dead strangled and battered his mouth stuffed with sand in the middle of the tidal strand separating the holy island of Oronsay from the larger island of Colonsay. The Lord of the Isles overlord of the islands assigns the task of finding the killer to Muirteach the Priors bastard son. Since breaking with his father and leaving the monastery Muirteach has spent his time acting as scribe for his uncle an island chieftain. Muirteachs father a powerful churchman leaves behind a mistress and several other bastards as well as his embittered eldest son who is thankful he will never hear the words My bastard son the cripple again. As Muirteach seeks to find his fathers murderer he is helped by the physician Fearchar Beaton and his daughter Mariota. Muirteach himself is suspected of the murder as are the Priors mistress her family and the sub-prior. The killer strikes again His Lordship wants the mystery solved before the Pope and the King in Edinburgh learn of it and Muirteach himself must come to terms with his own troubled relationship with his father. Muirteachs investigation submerges him deep into a whirlpool of deceit long buried sins and treachery from which no one emerges unscathed.