Edinburgh & Islay

When a son of Scotland's most-medieval city channeled its legacies of vice and bloodshed into popular tales, he took inspiration from the link between its shadowy pub culture and innovations in urban brewing. Following his path through Edinburgh's old taverns reveals his influence on the city's growing stable of mystery writers. Further off shore, Scotland's famed whisky island is holding its own book festival, including inside its legendary distilleries. Between cold winds and drams of Scotch, visitors can see how this Hebridean isolation helped a writer in the 1940s conjure a vision of the future that's become more haunting with every passing year.