I’ll admit that the first few times that I heard British mystery shows describing police ranks, I was a bit confused. What the heck is a constable anyway? And why do folks rarely use the word “detective”? Criminal Investigation Department (CID) It can be confusing, and I’ve finally been able to sort out some of…
Last we saw DI Jimmy Perez in print, he was leaving Fair Isle for Orkney in Ann Cleeves’ novel, Wild Fire, the last of the Shetland books. But it turns out, Cleeves wasn’t finished with Perez just yet. Nearly twenty years ago, Cleeves introduced Perez in Raven Black (2006), her first Shetland novel. He would…
There’s something special about small words (admit it, you love the word “wee”). In the Shetland and Orkney dialects of Scots, one such word is peerie. Peerie means small or tiny. You might hear someone in Shetland say: “A peerie lass ran by the shop,” meaning “A little girl ran by the shop.” Peerie is…
If you’ve watched even a single episode of Shetland, you’ve probably heard the word croft — and maybe pictured a little stone cottage perched against a backdrop of sea and sky. You wouldn’t be far off. A croft is a small agricultural holding—usually a modest house on a patch of land—found mainly in the Scottish…
There’s a uniqueness about British mystery series — from the brooding landscapes of Shetland to the sharp wit of Vera and the quiet tension of Broadchurch. But beyond the crimes and clues, these shows are full of wonderful words, turns of phrase, and bits of dialect that give them their distinct flavor. So, from time…
