A dogged reporter takes on a mysterious cabal in 'The Diary of Lies'

Back when Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein helped bring down Richard Nixon's presidency, being a reporter seemed like the coolest, most romantic job in the world. The young flocked to journalism school. Half a century on, though, newspapers struggle just to survive . Media barons buckle to protect the bottom line . And governments everywhere work hard to muzzle the press .

Still, there are some intrepid reporters ready to fight the good fight — especially in fiction. One of these is Shona Sandison, the Edinburgh-based heroine of a crime series by the terrific Scottish writer Philip Miller. The third and latest installment — The Diary of Lies — is now out from Soho Crime, and it finds Shona investigating a mysterious cabal whose aims are more than a little sinister. Far from b