Sturgeon's Crime Fiction Sob Story.

Last week Peter Murrell was jailed for five years. His estranged wife remains at large. For now.

As she soaks up the sun in Camden…the undisputed heartland of Scottish nationalism….Nicola Sturgeon insists she is innocent. Central to her defence is the claim Murrell’s crimes were beyond anything she could possibly have imagined.

Yet here’s the thing. The former First Minister is positively a connoisseur of the darker side of human nature. A self-professed “massive fan of crime fiction” …she regularly speaks at festivals devoted to the genre.

What’s more the idea of a powerful feminist being betrayed by a husband who steals huge sums of money then covers his tracks for a decade could hardly have struck Nicola Sturgeon as entirely outlandish. It formed the plot of a book Peter Murrell gave her as a Valentine’s gift.

Sturgeon would later say the novel was so gripping she could not put it down. She stayed up until 2am to finish it. What was it about the plot of ‘Black Widow’ that so transfixed Nicola Sturgeon? And what light might it shed on her professions of innocence now?

‘Did she do it?’ asks the cover.

Let’s find out.