A Place of Execution

A Place of Execution

by ValMcDermid (Author)

Synopsis

Stunning new psychological thriller from Britain's most exciting crime writer, the award-winning Val McDermid -- 'Compelling and atmospheric...a tour de force' -- Minette Walters Winter 1963: two children have disappeared off the streets of Manchester; the murderous careers of Myra Hindley and Ian Brady have begun. On a freezing day in December, another child goes missing: thirteen-year-old Alison Carter vanishes from the isolated Derbyshire hamlet of Scardale, a small-inward-looking community which has little contact with the outside world. For the young George Bennett, a newly promoted inspector, it is the beginning of his most difficult and harrowing case: a murder with no body, an investigation with more dead ends and closed faces than he'd have found in the anonymity of the inner city, an outcome which reverberates down the years. Decades later he finally tells his story to journalist Catherine Heathcote, but just when the book is poised for publication, Bennett unaccountably tries to pull the plug. He has new information which he refuses to divulge, new information that threatens the very foundations of his existence. Catherine is forced to reinvestigate the past, with results that turn the world upside down. A Greek tragedy in modern England, A Place of Execution is a taut psychological suspense thriller that uniquely explores, exposes and explodes the border between reality and illusion in a multi-layered narrative that turns expectations on their head and reminds us that what we know is what we do not know. A monstrous tale of deception, the technique of the telling is the greatest deception of all.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 416
Edition: Australia New Zealand Airport and Ireland only ed
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 07 Jun 1999

ISBN 10: 0002326922
ISBN 13: 9780002326926
Prizes: Shortlisted for CWA Gold Dagger for Fiction 1999.

Media Reviews

'From the first pages, we know we're in the hands of a master this book will earn its author a place in that rare pantheon - the truly literary suspense novel' Jeffrey Deaver

`Beautifully written ... It may be that McDermid will write better novels than this in the future, but I do not see how' Daily Telegraph

'One of the best detective stories I've read' Ruth Rendell

`A substantial book and an impressive one, possibly the best McDermid has written and it takes this most accomplished writer into higher territory' Sunday Telegraph

'A Place of Execution is a wake-up call to crime writers everywhere. A terrific and original novel, brilliantly executed' Mirror

Author Bio

Val McDermid grew up in a Scottish mining community then read English at Oxford. She was a journalist for sixteen years, spending the last three years as Northern Bureau Chief of a national Sunday tabloid. Now a full-time writer, she divides her time between Cheshire and Northumberland. Her novels have won international acclaim and a number of prestigious awards, including the Gold Dagger for best crime novel of the year, the Anthony Award for best novel, and the Los Angeles Times Book of the Year Award. Her thriller series featuring criminal profiler Tony Hill has been adapted into the much-loved TV series Wire in the Blood.