Val McDermid: A Darker Domain (USA 2010)

From the Publisher:
Past and present intertwine in this brilliant exploration of loyalty and greed from bestselling mistress of suspense Val McDermid.
Fife, Scotland, 1984. Mick Prentice abandons his family at the height of a politically charged national miners' strike to join the strikebreakers down south. Despised and disowned by friends and relatives, he is not reported missing until twenty-three years later.

Fife, Scotland, 1985. Kidnapped heiress Catriona Maclennan Grant is killed and her baby son vanishes when the ransom payoff goes horribly wrong. In 2008, a tourist in Tuscany stumbles upon dramatic new evidence that reopens the investigation.

Already immersed in the Prentice affair, Detective Karen Pirie, newly appointed head of the Cold Case Review Team, wants to make her mark with this second unsolved 1980s mystery. But two decades' worth of secrets are leading Pirie into a dark domain of violence and betrayal -- a place darker than any she has previously entered.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain. A Novel. Harper Paperbacks, ISBN: 9780061688997 (June, 2010), 355 p., $14.99.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain (UK 2009)

From the Publisher:
The superb new psychological thriller from 'Queen of Crime' Val McDermid fuses her trademark plot twists and characterization with one of the most important events in recent UK history -- the 1984 Miners' Strike.

Twenty-five years ago, the daughter of Scotland's richest man and her baby son were kidnapped and held to ransom. But Catriona Grant ended up dead and little Adam's fate is still unknown. When a new clue is discovered in a deserted Tuscan villa -- along with grisly evidence of a recent murder -- cold case expert DI Karen Pirie is assigned to follow the trail. She's already working a case from the same year. During the Miners' Strike of 1984, pit worker Mick Prentice vanished. He was presumed to have broken ranks and fled south with other 'scabs'! but Karen finds that the reported events of that night don't add up. Where did he really go? And is there a link to the Grant mystery?

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain. A Novel. Harper, ISBN: 9780007243310 (April, 2009), 371 p., £6.99.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain (USA 2009)

From the Publisher:
Past and present intertwine in this rare stand-alone novel of taut psychological drama -- a brilliant exploration of loyalty and greed from the bestselling mistress of suspense.

Fife, Scotland, 1985. Heiress Catriona Maclennan Grant and her baby son are kidnapped. The ransom payoff goes horribly wrong and Grant is killed. Her son disappears without a trace -- until 2008, when a tourist in Tuscany stumbles upon dramatic new evidence that reopens the investigation.

Fife, 1984. At the height of the politically charged national miners' strike, Mick Prentice abandons his family to join the strikebreakers down south. Labelled a blackleg scab, he's as good as dead as far as his friends and relatives care. Twenty-three years later, a young woman walks into a police station to report Mick Prentice missing. Detective Karen Pirie, head of the Cold Case Review Team, wants to know why it's taken so long for anyone to notice.

For Pirie, already immersed in the Prentice investigation, a second foray into a 1980s investigation gone cold -- this time, the Grant kidnapping -- offers an opportunity to make her mark. But it's sure to come at an extremely high price. As she works to unravel these mysteries, two decades of secrets will lead Karen Pirie into a dark domain of violence and betrayal -- darker than any she has yet encountered.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain. A Novel. Harper, ISBN: 9780061688980 (January, 2009), 355 p., $24.99.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain (UK 2008)

From the Publisher:
It seemed like an unsolvable mystery at the time: a wealthy heiress and son kidnapped in Fife, then a botched payoff, leaving her dead with no trace of the child.

So when, over twenty-five years later, a possible clue is discovered by a journalist in Tuscany, cold case expert DI Karen Pirie doesn't hold much hope of unravelling the infamous enigma.

She's already investigating a case from the same year. At the height of the miner's strike, Mick Prentice broke ranks to join 'scab' strike-breakers down south. But new evidence suggests Mick's disappearance may not be as straightforward as that - and Karen's investigations take her into a dark domain of secrets, betrayal and the ultimate violence...

Past and present intertwine in a novel of taut psychological suspense that explores the intersection of desire and greed.

Val McDermid: A Darker Domain. HarperCollins, ISBN: 9780007243297 (September, 2008), 384 p., £18.99.