A Place of Execution - Val McDermid

~~~INTRODUCTION~~~ I buy a lot of books from charity shops – after all they’re cheap, accessible, tend to have an impressive range of genres available and at the same time you’re supporting a good cause in a way that offers a benefit to you as well as the organisation concerned. I found myself in the local Oxfam shop a couple of months ago. Recently refurbished, it holds a remarkable collection of books, organised by author making it easy to see what’s on offer. I was delighted and surprised to see an early Val McDermid book on sale for the princely sum of £1.50 and in almost pristine condition, so of course, I had to have it. This is my fourth ...

This mystery from Val McDermid is an absorbing story, enjoyable to read. The plot is effectively in two parts, a clever combination of police procedural and amateur detective novels. However, while worth reading, it is ultimately disappointing because of shortcomings which detract from the plot. The book is firmly rooted in its setting: an isolated village, Scardale, in the Peak District, at the time of the Moors Murders. Scardale’s physical isolation is reflected in its closely-related families and feudal attitudes. The outside world, in the form of the police, intrudes when the squire’s step-daughter goes missing. The village closes ranks ...

Val McDermid is best known for her two series of crime thrillers - the rather light-hearted novels with PI Kate Brannigan and the far darker ones with criminal profiler Dr Tony Hill. A Place of Execution breaks out of these moulds in that it is a stand-alone novel. It has much of the darkness of the Tony Hill books without the level of explicit violence. The most notable point of this book is its unusual structure. It's not so much a single book as two books. Or possibly even three. Let me explain... The book is based around the disappearance in the '60s of schoolgirl Alison Carter. The setting is an isolated Derbyshire village, which ...