A Place of Execution, by Val McDermid

A Place of Execution is a book I picked up because an online book club I’m in was reading it, and it really grabbed me almost from the first pages. It’s the story of a young police officer investigating the disappearance of a 13-year-old girl from an incredibly remote and isolated English village in 1963. The bulk of the story unfolds as a straightforward mystery, with the police trying to get the taciturn villagers to open up enough to solve the mystery of what befell the young girl. But the reader knows from the beginning that there will be a twist at the end — the framing device of the novel is that in the 1990s, a journalist is writing a book about this case. The now-retired police officer who cracked the case has been co-operating with her and giving interviews, but then, just as the book is about to go to press, he writes her a letter begging her to withhold publication — new information about the old case has come to light that he cannot reveal, but that changes everything.

With this letter at the beginning of the book, even as we read through what appears to be a mystery novel, we know that the satisfying conclusion is not what it seems to be: the police detective appears to solve the crime, but we know that there must be a missing piece that will come to light more than 30 years in the future.

Knowing this, I read the 1963 story looking for missed clues, trying to figure out what the foreshadowed twist would be. When I did get to the reveal, though, it genuinely took me by surprise. Though the subject matter is grim, the puzzle-solving aspect of this mystery made it a joy from start to finish.