#BookReview ‘The Night Watcher’ by Tariq Ashkanani

In this tense thriller from the winner of the Bloody Scotland Debut Prize, PI Callie Munro is hunting a serial killer on the streets of Edinburgh. But he’s already found her…

As private investigators go, Callie Munro is tougher than most. She’s had to be. Abandoned as a baby and raised by a succession of strangers, she knows a thing or two about surviving…

…but she never expected to find herself hunting a serial killer.

After uncovering a string of missing women―women no one seems to care about―Callie refuses to look away. With police ignoring the evidence, her only ally is an organised crime boss with his own agenda.

The deeper Callie digs, the more dangerous the hunt becomes. Every clue exposes another lie. Every step brings the killer closer.

She’s fighting for the forgotten. But if she’s not careful, she’ll be next.

Hugest of thanks to Tandem Collective for inviting me to be a part of a readalong for the first Callie Munro thriller, ‘The Night Watcher’ which was published by Thomas and Mercer in December 2025.

It clearly has an Edinburgh setting, which provides context as well as geography for the tale Tariq is telling, and becomes a part of the narrative which Callie is telling.

A substandard relationship with the boring Richard, a flat which she has just the way she likes it and a job as a private eye which leads her into uncomfortable situations, Callie is a woman living by her nerves and observational skills alike.

She keeps her own flat -thank CHRIST! But no spoilers why!-to maintain her own space after having a past in care, whose scars she carries with her in the form of a flashback memory to 4 boys , beating another to death.

There are seeds planted about her past, something which Callie does not dwell on but you, as a reader, pick up and store away as you picture her as a fully realised person (flaws and all. I became extremely concerned about her cholesterol intake by the end of the book thanks to her frequent fry-ups).

She spends the majority of her time following people to prove their guilt in breaking vows and promises made ,with her friend Martin supplying her with the equipment she needs to track down /provide information about those she is looking into.

Her first case in this novel involves breaking the news of a wife’s infidelity to her husband who, having already found this out, refuses to pay Callie and to boot, assaults her.

On reporting this to the police due to concerns that Grant may take his anger out on Amy, his wife, she becomes embroiled in a murder mystery going back several female victims, but currently being kept from the public.

When Grant begs her to look into Amy’s disappearance, Callie finds herself crossing paths with local gangsters, investigating historic abuse of children and also leads her close to finding out just who her parents were…

If she survives the case of the ‘Night Watcher’, she just might be able to work out who she is, and what she is doing with her life.

Callie’s unresolved trauma is, I feel, going to be examined in future instalments in the series, Tariq teases you with clues but does not reveal his hand fully, compelling the storyline to keep up the frantic pace whilst placing Callie at the heart of it.

An engaging and very real protagonist with a race against time to save the missing women abducted by the Night Watcher, this is a taut and suspenseful thriller which will keep you guessing!

Tariq Ashkanani is a writer based in Edinburgh, Scotland.

His debut ‘Welcome To Cooper’ won the Bloody Scotland Debut Award and was shortlisted for the CWA New Blood Dagger. The Cooper-verse continues in the prequel novel, ‘Follow Me To The Edge’

His last book – ‘‘The Midnight King’ – won the Bloody Scotland McIlvanney Award.

When he’s not writing, his dulcet tones can be heard interviewing other writers on the podcast Page One, which he hosts.