The Shetland Series by Ann Cleeves

 I have now read all eight of Ann Cleeves original series of books, and I've seen all TV episodes u to the end of series seven. I know I have two more series to look foward to, with a change of lead as DI Jimmy Perez (Douglas Henshal) is replaced by DI Ruth Calder (Ashley Jensen). 

I have enjoyed all of them, print and screen, which has surprised me a bit. I often prefer books to filmed interpretations, but these differ a lot, particularly in characterisation and I have really enjoyed both. Ann Cleeves is a superb writer, grounded in her locations and deeply involved with her characters. 

The TV interpretation of the Shetland stories is excellent, the cinematography and locations are beautiful, enigmatic and give the entire series a noir atmosphere which really suits the stories, although liberties are taken, and only series one and two are based on the stories in the books. The character of Fran, in particular is very different, she doesn't appear at all on TV, she's just Cassie's deceased mum and Jimmy Perez' dead wife. 

The characters of two other police officers, Sandy Wilson and Alison McIntosh (Tosh) are treated radically differently in the books. Sandy (played on TV by native Shetlander Steven Robertson) plays a major role in print, the action is often from his POV and his character's development over the series is almost as good as that of Jimmy Perez (Douglas Henshall), whilst Sandy's TV role is less significant. On the other hand Tosh (Alison O'Donnell) is Perez right-hand woman on TV yet hardly appears in the books at all.

The first, two part TV series is based on The Red Bones, which is probably the best of the books, so I'm not surprised they chose this story to begin with. It worked and was popular so series two involved three more books, Raven Black, Dead Water and Blue Lightening. Each story was given two episodes. After that the TV stories diverged from the remaining novels. 

As a fellow writer I will name the TV writers, no more actors:- episodes were written exclusively for the screen by Gaby Chiappe, David Kane, Richard Davidson, Robert Murphy, Alexander Perrin, Paul Logue and Louise Ironside, Later series 8 and 9, which I haven't yet viewed, were Paul Logue  and Denise Paul.

Meanwhile Ann Cleeves, the author, has just released another Jimmy Perez story, which I'm excited about and look froward to reading. It's her first Perez story since 2018 and is no longer set on Shetland. Ann has said about the book, that she felt there needed to be more to DI Jimmy Perez story.