A CRIME thriller released by a former Clacks police officer is helping to raise funds for a Wee County school.

Alloa man John Orr recently released Tight Lines: A Sutherland and Caithness Murder Mystery and is set to hand over funds to Lochies School in Sauchie.

Written in memory of dear friend Dougie, Tight Lines is a work of fiction which takes audiences on a murder mystery journey.

A day's fishing up north quickly goes south as the story somersaults into a murder, involving drugs and gangsters from Manchester.

Readers online have been praising the novella, which takes the reader across the country and includes street and place names from around Alloa, with some subtle changes.

John, a retired police officer who served in Stirling and celebrated his 70th birthday earlier in June, was encouraged by his granddaughter, a teacher-in-training, to pen the book after he wrote a short story for her.

He said: "It's just about two boys getting involved in something that they shouldn't get involved in, but they couldn't help getting involved in."

Characters in the book are named after the author's grandchildren as well as friends and while much of the story is set around Alloa and Stirling, some scenes take the reader as far as Tenerife.

"It's easy reading," John added. "It's called Tight Lines with reference to my best mate we used to go fishing with – 'tight lines' is one of the things we used to say when we went fishing [meaning] have a good day."

And "tight lines" is also a reference to the lines of drugs being transported across the country, called to as "county lines" by the National Crime Agency nowadays.

John has pledged to donate the first £100 of proceeds from the book will go to Lochies School, where one of the pupils is the child of one of John's friends.

"Anything to help the kids up there," John added, explaining that he is hoping to hand over the funds as soon as it is safe to do so.

Tight Lines: A Sutherland and Caithness Murder Mystery by John V.A. Orr is available online via Amazon.