Good red herring - Susan Maxwell

An intriguingmurder mysteryset in an imaginary world, peopled by vampires, dimorphs, luchrupns and the odd - very odd - Salmon Farsade, anorphanwith the ability to read auras. Salmon becomes apprenticed to Muinbeo's most famous nocturnal detective, the long-lived and sharp-toothedInspector McCabe, and together they try to sniff out who killed Fen Maguire - and why.

'Hard silver light caught in her dark hair, the moon shadows giving her pointed face a romance it lacked in life. He wedged his nose against the clenched hand under the bent arm, against the blood-soaked earth where her life had finally trickled away. The ghost of wind, which only he could feel, stirred, and he raised his head. Cullen had learned the odour of her dead body, and turned to inhale the story of her death.'