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    A Darker Domain
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    A Darker Domain
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    A Darker Domain
    Audiobook12 hours

    A Darker Domain

    Written by Val McDermid

    Narrated by Eilidh Fraser

    3.5/5

    ()

    Unavailable in your country

    Unavailable in your country

    About this audiobook

    The second riveting crime novel in the Karen Pirie series, from No.1 Sunday Times bestseller Val McDermid.

    Twenty-five years ago, a woman and her baby son were kidnapped and held to ransom. Catriona Grant ended up dead and little Adam's fate has remained a mystery ever since.

    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. Where did he really go? And is there a link to the Grant mystery?

    The truth is stranger – and far darker – than fiction.

    ‘A superb mystery' The Times

    ‘Val McDermid is a born storyteller' Sunday Telegraph

    ‘A searing piece … McDermid orchestrates the tension with authority.' Express

    ‘Torture, warped psyches, unspeakable cellars: Val McDermid sends you to bed with lights blazing' Sunday Times

    ‘One of the best modern writers of crime fiction … Excellent' Scotland on Sunday
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherW. F. Howes Ltd
    Release dateAug 1, 2009
    ISBN9781407447605
    Unavailable
    A Darker Domain
    Author

    Val McDermid

    Val McDermid is a No.1 bestseller whose novels have been translated into more than thirty languages, and have sold more than sixteen million copies. She has won many awards internationally, including the CWA Gold Dagger for best crime novel of the year. She was inducted into the ITV3 Crime Thriller Awards Hall of Fame in 2009, was the recipient of the CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger in 2010. Val writes full time and lives in Edinburgh and the East Neuk of Fife.

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    Reviews for A Darker Domain

    3.5/5

    359 ratings31 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This book proved to me that preconceived ideas are dangerous. I would never have chosen to read this book normally. British, with much of it set in the 80's during the miners strike, it sounded dreary as hell. I had to read it for my book group though, and I'm so pleased I did. I love a mystery story, and this is what it was. A fast-paced action thriller this book is not, but it moved at just the right pace switching between past and present effortlessly. The characters were believable and the plot was easy to care about. This book is a proper 'whodunnit' and 'whydunnit'. Fab.
    • 5/5
      An excellent follow to the first novel. Great development !
    • 4/5
      DI Karen Pirie investigates two cold cases: a botched kidnapping and a miner missing since the miner's strike in 1984. Past and present are intertwined skillfully. The investigation takes place in Scotland, England and Italy.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed reading this novel a lot, but not quite as much as the first book of the series. That is mainly due to the structure - there are a lot of time warps in the first half of the book, the time and setting changes every few pages because there are so many flashbacks. The flashbacks are effectively used to tell the story and convey the emotions of the characters, but I needed some time to get into this kind of storytelling.There are two cold cases which I found equally interesting: A woman desperately seeks to save her son who needs a bone marrow transplant, so she is looking for her father, a miner who left without a trace in the 1980s during the miners' strike. One of the richest men in Scotland is looking for his grandson who was lost without a trace after he and his mother were kidnapped and the ransom delivery went terribly wrong. This happened in the 1980s as well and for a long time there was no hope, until suddenly, some new evidence appears.Karen Pirie is assigned to the second case, although to her, the first case seems much more interesting and urgent.I found both cases very compelling, although the novel takes a lot of time in the beginning and the plot could have moved a little faster. On the other hand, the ending seemed a little rushed and I would have liked a few more explanations. It is a bit of a sudden ending.All in all, I was still spell-bound by this novel, though, and cannot wait to read the third installment and meet Karen Pirie again!
    • 4/5
      Karen Pirie is now a DI in charge of the cold case unit, and she's investigating a new lead in a 25-year-old unsolved kidnapping. A journalist is also mightily interested in that matter, as she is the one who discovered the potential key to the crime, and she feels it just might be fodder for a career-defining book. The two women are not necessarily working in concert, although their goal is ostensibly the same. Meanwhile, DI Pirie has another mystery on her hands---the long-ago disappearance of a man whose family is just now reporting him missing. Lots of threads to follow here, and possibly just a bit of over-plotting, but gripping from beginning to end.
    • 4/5
      The second of McDermid's books that I've read, and I quite enjoyed this one as much as the first. Good character development and a well paced mystery with just enough threads to keep things interesting.
    • 4/5
      I haven't read the first in this series, but gather there were too many spoilers in this one to go back and read it now. I liked this one at first, although the multiple viewpoints and timeframes were wearying and took a while to get to grips with. However, I fell out of love with it the further on I read.SPOILERSThe way the two cold cases were revealed to be linked didn't ring true somehow. Would Mick really have given up all contact with Misha? Why did Jenny try so hard to get the police to drop the case of his disappearance? I don't like books where the murderer(s) get away with it. I didn't feel much sympathy for any of the characters really, although I did like Karen and Phil, the detectives.
    • 4/5
      I don’t remember too much about the British coal miner’s strike of 1984 and so it was interesting to read this mystery which deals with two occurrences that happened during that fraught period. And of course McDermid makes the process of solving the cold cases in 2007 a gripping read. One of the reasons is that there are no chapter breaks just occasional jumps in the action between 1984/85 and 2007. I was sucked in to reading far more at one sitting because I couldn’t find a good place to stop reading (not that I’m complaining too much about that).DI Karen Pirie is in charge of Cold Cases in the Fife District of Scotland. So when a woman comes to lodge a missing person report for her father who disappeared in 1984 the desk sergeant thought Pirie would be the logical person to handle it. Mick Prentice was a coal miner who disappeared the same night five other men went to Nottingham to scab in the coal mines there. So it was assumed that Mick had gone with them even though it seemed to go against his staunch union principles. When his daughter needs a donor to save her son from a rare disease and she has exhausted all other relatives she decides to search for her father. He did not go to Nottingham with the others; he seems to have disappeared entirely. Just as Pirie is sinking her teeth into this case she is summoned to Sir Broderick Maclennan Grant’s home because a clue about his daughter’s and grandson’s kidnapping (and the daughter’s subsequent death at a botched ransom delivery) from 1985 has been found by a journalist. Sir Brodie wants Pirie to investigate using the new evidence because she has a reputation for thinking outside the box. Pirie and her team (especially DS Phil Parhatka) pursue both cases but the kidnapping clue turned up in Tuscany so they have to rely on the Italian police to do legwork there. That leaves the local investigation getting more attention than Sir Brodie and Pirie’s supervisor (nicknamed the Macaroon) like but Pirie doesn’t care much for following protocol. Sir Brodie does have other means at his disposal as he sends the journalist who found the clue back to Tuscany where she uncovers evidence that may mean Sir Brodie’s grandson is still alive. It’s amazing how much one can turn up about events more than 20 years before if one asks the right questions.This is the second book I have read recently set in coal mining areas having worker unrest. The Widows took place in Ohio in the 1920s but the divisions between the owners and the workers are remarkably similar.
    • 4/5
      Karen leaned back in her chair, not liking the answer she came up with, but knowing there would be nothing better coming from the man opposite her. ‘You were a right bunch of fucking cowboys in the old days, weren’t you?’ There was no admiration in her tone.

      I don't know what I expected but I did not expect to like this book as much as I did. I gather from a lot of comments and other reviews that this is one of McDermid's weaker offerings but I actually really enjoyed the mix of interlinking stories, each of which had it's own element of suspense:

      The search for a donor that is compatible with a sick child.
      The disappearance of a man who seemingly one day walks out on his family in the midst of the 1984 miners' strikes.
      The journalist in search of a story.
      The business oligarch in search of his peace of mind.
      And DI Karen Pirie searching for the solutions to all of these puzzles.

      As mentioned before, I'm not keen on reading gory tales or scary thrillers, and I was pleasantly surprised that the suspense - and there are oodles of suspense in this - was built not on gory facts but on characters and atmosphere. The elements of forensic detail just helped piece the clues together and follow the investigation.

      So, yes, my apprehension of reading this was totally unwarranted - and yes, it was all in my head. Just as well, because having read this one I look forward to reading more by McDermid. It's is not just her writing style that made me hungry for more but also the setting - Kingdom of Fife - and the historical snippets.
    • 3/5
      Belle Richards discovered something that would surely boost her journalistic career to the next level. She was dreaming of it becoming the next big story. She recognized the puppeteer posters, hidden in a run-down Italian villa in Tuscany, for what they were – the tools that had been used over twenty years before to communicate with Sir Brody Grant, making their demands to release his kidnapped daughter and grandson.Collaterally, we have Misha who goes to DI Karen Pirie, part of the cold case team in Fife, to report a missing person – her dad – he went missing 22 years before. She’s thinking that if she finds him, he may be a match for the bone marrow transplant needed to save her son who has a rare disease. If he’s found, she’s hoping he will agree to help.The premise is awesome. It was enjoyable to watch both Belle Richards and DI Karen Pirie work on clues of two separate instances which would eventually connect. It took a while because instead of going to the police, Belle had taken her documents directly to Sir Brody. The police would stall the process, but Sir Brody Grant, who lost his daughter and failed to get his grandson back, would provide all she needed to move the investigation forward. The novel had a heaping dose of suspense and the story was told alternatively from the present (2008) and 1984. However, the ending, which dropped off like lemmings over a cliff, was a disappointment. It felt rushed, confusing, and failed to answer some of my basic questions. Also, for those sensitive to language, the f-word was used multiple times. Rating: 2.5 out of 5.
    • 4/5
      In1985, in Fife, Scotland, Catriona Grant and her infant son were taken by kidnappers who demanded that her wealthy father pay a huge ransom of cash and uncut diamonds to get her and his grandson back. Fearing that something would go wrong, Cat's father only reluctantly got the police involved in the handoff of the ransom. And, as it turned out, something did go terribly wrong on the beach that night, something that resulted in his daughter's death and the disappearance of his grandson.Now, some twenty-three years later, Detective Karen Pirie, who was only a child at the time of the botched kidnapping, is head of Fife's Cold Case Review Team, a job she both enjoys and is very good at. The Catriona Grant kidnapping case, although it was never closed, is not being actively worked at present, but all that changes on the day that a young woman walks into the police station to report that her father is missing - and has been missing for twenty-three years. Intrigued by what the woman tells her, Karen decides on her own to classify this new case as a cold one – knowing full well that her superiors are going to explode when they learn that’s what she’s done - and begins to work on it before it can be assigned to another section.In typical Val McDermid fashion, the missing person report opens up a can of worms involving numerous characters, side plots, and settings that keep the reader guessing until the very end. Detective Pirie, wondering why no one ever bothered to report Mick Prentice missing up to now, learns that the 1984 national miners' strike greatly influenced what happened to the missing man. With the discovery of evidence that seems linked to both the Grant kidnapping and to the missing man, Pirie jumps at the chance to work to work the two cases simultaneously – whether her boss knows it or not. The best thing she has going for her is that the two cases occurred within weeks of each other, meaning that the background information she gathers on one case often helps on the other. As the two cases begin to overlap more and more, Pirie begins to understand that many people are still paying the price for what happened on one terrible 1985 night, and that they will do anything to keep their secrets hidden. If they haven't already read this 2009 standalone novel, Val McDermid fans will do well to find themselves a copy of A Darker Domain and get to it. This highly atmospheric novel also makes a good introduction to McDermid's work for fans of the genre who may still know her only by reputation.
    • 3/5
      It was entertaining, but only so much. As another reviewer said, the Big Reveal was pretty obvious from very early on, and the author did not really make an effort other than to have one of the actors describe it all in an implausibly detailed letter.
    • 5/5
      A miner goes missing 25 years previously but is only reported missing in the present 25 years later. This is a search for him and what really happened...oh this book I just could not put down! I am a book seller and I was listing books and picked this one up and opened the first page (yes, a book seller loves to read!) and couldn't stop reading it. I got right into it and I know you will too! Take a chance on this book-its a great read!
    • 5/5
      An excellent read with well-rounded characters and a plot which moves seamlessly from the 1984-5 ill-fated miners' strike to 2007. DI Karen Pirie is asked to take on an unusual cold case where a man disappeared during the miners' strike but was never reported missing at the time, but now has because the man's daughter has a young son suffering from an incurable disease and needs a donor. No sooner has she started the investigation, which intrigues her, than her boss instructs her to look at another cold case, the unsolved kidnap and murder of a local millionaire's daughter about which fresh evidence has come to light. Two separate cases, apparently not connected, reach a surprising conclusion. The scenes and characters relating to the miners' strike are particularly well-observed and reflect the author's own experience during the strike. Recommended.
    • 3/5
      bookshelves: published-2008, tbr-busting-2014, mystery-thriller, winter-20132014, britain-scotland, fife, fraudio, cold-case, politics, families, period-pieceRead from January 26 to February 03, 2014Description: Karen Pirie is the newly appointed Deputy Inspector of the Cold Case Unit, and her first investigation takes her 25 years into the past to the national miners' strike. At the time, a kidnapping gone wrong left a small boy missing, but new evidence suggests he might still be alive. As Pirie delves deeper, she realizes the boy's disapperance may be linked to another cold case involving a missing miner.Having secured a few McDermid titles, I seemed to have kicked off with the wrong one, 'A Darker Domain' held scant interest; nowhere near 'A Place of Execution'.Was wanting a KAPOW and reaped a fizzle.Still, it kept me company whilst administering tea, biscuits and aspirins to the sick and needy; dear M has a serious bout of ::Man::Cold::TR The Mermaids Singing (Tony Hill & Carol Jordan, #1)TR The Wire In The Blood (Tony Hill & Carol Jordan, #2)3* The Distant Echo4* A Place Of Execution3* A Darker Domain3* Clean Break2* Village SOSCrossposted:WordpressBooklikesLeafMarkLibrarythingaNobii
    • 4/5
      It was a great listening. Two stories which are related to each other also it wasn't really obvious in the beginning. It's starting with a disappearance of a father who was working as a miner during the miners strike leaving behind a wife and a daughter. The daughter is starting out to search her father's whereabouts twenty years later with the help of the police. On the other hand a very rich baron is looking for his grandson who's disappearance is laying back also twenty years. The scenes are switching between Scotland and Tuscany. The story is very gripping and I couldn't stop the listening.
    • 4/5
      I received this book as a SantaThing gift and I was pleasantly surprised by the storyline! The disappearance of a miner in the 1980s and the kidnapping of an heiress and her son are brought together in various investigative twists, and, while I still prefer the 'Tony Hill' series, I have enjoyed reading about Karen. Far from the the usual psychos and horrific murders in the other series, in here the characters are very much down to earth and likeable. There are no dismembered bodies to speak (much) of and the ending is not what you would call 'happy' but is nearer to what is real in terms of office politics and relationships. Highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      As always, Val Mcdermid delivers another original plot populated with protagonists for whom I want to cheer. I am never able to predict the trajectory of events in her stories, if I could I wouldn't enjoy them so much. It was an exciting read that I finished in two days, I couldn't stand the suspense.
    • 3/5
      An interesting mystery book that is set during a mining strike and this gives story a little something extra. The plot is a bit silly, as most mystery stories are, but it kept my attention until the end.
    • 2/5
      This was a very hard book to get into. It almost became a DNF. I tried to finish it in time for a book discussion but it took me over 3 weeks to listen to it. I didn't find ANY of the characters compelling or desirable. I found them all rather annoying. It was a very slow start and middle. The beginning story of looking for a lost father who could possible have helped his sick grandson with a bone marrow transfusion got quite lost and trampled until the last 2 pages. Overall a very unsatisfying read.
    • 4/5
      I was initially drawn to the premise of a missing persons case where the person isn't reported missing until more than 20 years after he disappeared. How could that be? As it turns out, a miner who disappeared during a tumultuous strike in 1984 was assumed to have gone south with several other `blackleg miners' to work as a scab. In such circumstances his absence was considered good riddance and nobody tried to find him. But now, years later, his grandson is ill and needs a transplant so his daughter sets out to find her dad only to find that her dad never went with the blacklegs and that nobody had seen him since. Is there any hope of finding him with a trail this cold? Is there any chance he may be alive? At the same time she is drawn into another cold case, one of a kidnapping gone horribly wrong. Are the cases connected? Can the kidnapped child still be alive? As I read A Darker Domain I got the impression that this book was much more personal to the author the other books of hers that I have read. I felt that she saw her story through the eyes of her protagonist, Detective Inspector Karen Pirie. As I learned later, McDermid did grow up in the coal towns she writes about and her father and grandfather were both miners. As there is far more than just fiction here, the reader can't help but get emotionally involved in the story and its outcome.Perhaps this intimacy with the setting is partially responsible for my one minor complaint. She discusses the strike and bandies about miners slang in such a way that one thinks she expects the whole world to know who Scargill was or what a `pit bing' is. It doesn't distract from the story but I can't help feeling that know would have given me a deeper understanding of the situation. A Darker Domain is an excellent example of the quality detective fiction coming out of Scotland these days and it's a far cry from Miss Marple. Thank God for that as I've never been one for tea and knitting.
    • 5/5
      Two cold cases, believable characters and fascinating background...this woman can write! She draws you into the world she's created and makes you care!For all those lamenting that this is not another Tony Hill - McDermid is so much more than just one series! She is a writer who can't be limited to just one character. Her other series and her stand alones are worth reading. I wish her a very, very long career!
    • 5/5
      First Line: The voice is soft, like the darkness that encloses them.It's another day in Fife, Scotland, and Detective Inspector Karen Pirie--newly appointed head of the Cold Case Review Team-- needs something to sink her teeth into. When a woman comes in to report her father as missing (he was last seen way back in 1984) and gives a few more details, Pirie decides to look into it. It has all the markings of a long shot, and a long shot is something she can't resist.She and her partner, Detective Sergeant Phil Parhatka, have barely begun to look for Mick Prentice when Pirie's superior officer has her drop everything and rush to the estate of Sir Broderick Maclennan Grant. Back in 1985, the mogul's daughter and grandson were kidnapped. A botched ransom drop left his daughter, Catriona, dead and his grandson, Adam, in the hands of the kidnappers never to be heard from again. New information has come to light in the Maclennan case, and now Pirie has two cold cases to solve, for she's not about to stop looking for Mick Prentice.McDermid has been one of my favorite mystery writers since I read A Place of Execution. This book did not disappoint. Pirie and her partner work very well together, and I'd love to see more books centered around these two. As the information on both cases is teased loose, it's told in a series of flashbacks, which let me become familiar with the characters' voices and behavior without confusing the storyline.A Darker Domain also brought home a little known (to me) period of British history-- of Margaret Thatcher, the unions, the coal miners and the strikes. Of men and families starving, the betrayal of the unions, and the excessive force used by the police. McDermid, whose own family struggled to survive these times, didn't present all this information in one vast history lesson, but through the lives and voices of her characters.Although both cold cases came together in such a way that strained credulity a bit, I still enjoyed this story and especially the character of Karen Pirie. I do hope I'll see more of her.
    • 3/5
      Det Inspector Karne Pirie and Det. Sgt Phil Parheta of the cold case squad are asked to find a person missing for over 20 years.Michelle "Misha" Gibson is desperately searching for her dad, Mick Prentice, who was apparently a strikebreaker in the 1984 miner's strike after which he disappeared. Both Misha and her mother thought that Mick had betrayed them by joining five others to break the strike and they didn't want any more to do with him. However, Misha and her husband John are in need. Their son Luke has Fanconi Anemia and is in need of a bone marrow donor and there's no one else to turn to.As Karen investigates this case, she is sent to the home of Sir Broderick Maclellan Grant, whose daughter and grandson were kidnapped in 1984. The payoff was botched and Cat Grant was killed, her son was never found. Now a tourist to Tuscany, Bel Richmond, who is also a reporter, has found some inportant evidence.With the two cases going on and the story bouncing back and forth from 1984 to the present, it was somewhat confusing and hard to remember which case was which.In spite of that, the story went well and was enjoyable.
    • 4/5
      A stand-alone novel by Val McDermid. A young woman comes to the cold case squad in Fife, Scotland, to report her father has been missing for twenty-two years. She and her mother believed he had turned scab during the 1984 national miners strike, and they wanted nothing more to do with him for turning traitor to the miners. Now the young woman's son is ill and needs help from a close relative, and the father may be her last chance. But he isn't where he ought to be if he had turned scab.In a parallel plot, new evidence turns up in a kidnapping case from Fife in 1985. Heiress Cat Grant and her son went missing, and at the ransom handover Cat was killed and her son was never found.McDermid is a highly-respected author and this book just reinforces her reputation. In a note before the book, she talks about the experiences of the strike by her relatives, and it is clear that she wants to tell the story of the strike, which she does well. But the plot is more than that , and is well done. The characterization is excellent, especially Karen Pirie and her partner Phil Parhatka, good enough that one hopes McDermid will use them again.Good read.
    • 5/5
      Val McDermid's "A Darker Domain" has a richly layered plot that, although rooted in the mining towns of Scotland, has tentacles that reach as far as Italy and Australia. The story begins when Detective Inspector Karen Pirie, head the Cold Case Review Team for the Fife Police Constabulary, agrees to look for the missing father of a mother whose child is dying of a rare disease. The only hope for the child is a bone marrow transplant from a family member. However, the father, Mick Prentice, disappeared 23 years ago during a wrenching miner's strike that left most of his family and acquaintances believing he had deserted them to cross the picket lines at the mines down south. Prying information out of the community after all the years and bitter memories is especially difficult as most of those connected to Mick harbor deep resentments against the police.At the same time, DI Pirie is assigned by specific request to investigate new evidence in the disappearance of a kidnap victim from the same time period, the grandson of Sir Broderick Maclennan Grant, a business mogul who gives orders and seldom takes them. His daughter was killed and his grandson taken for good during a botched ransom exchange. Grant is determined to use all money and means at his disposal to follow this new trail. McDermid uses a complex format to present her two plots that requires the reader to pay apt attention to date stamps that announce shifts in time, space, and perspective as the story ricochets back and forth between various characters, countries, and events. The voice is third-person but the viewpoint frequently shifts between all the persons of interest in this fast-paced and fascinating tale that winds through caves and mining towns on the Scottish coast and down narrow roads and into delapitated villas in Italy. If you haven't been introduced to Val McDermid, this novel is a great place to begin.
    • 5/5
      I really like thrillers of this kind - where a case is investigated many years after it happened. I manage to still be surprised if a rather central character of a book, and a likeable at that, is killed off - this only happens in European thrillers, never American is my experience. And I like it, I feel like it's more honest to let the story progress like that and not have someone come to the rescure at the last minute.I thought the story gave an intersting insight into scottish mining communities and the strike. I read up some more information afterwards on Wikipedia as well to get some background. I like how the puzzle pieces of the two stories slowly come together, even if the setting of detective against her stubborn, clueless, spineless superior officer is a bit old.Thanks so much for sending this to me, GingerWhinger, I really appreciated it. A perfect summer read!
    • 4/5
      Val McDermid delivers consistently good mystery fiction. Her series with Tony Hill is excellent throughout & I have yet to read a standalone of hers that wasn't also wonderful.McDermid writes wonderfully complex & twisty characters & plots. I also really enjoy her settings - typically the North of England or Scotland - places we all tend to read less about.Born into a coal mining family in Scotland, this novel (which covers the disappearances of 3 people during the time of the miner's strike in 1984) is obviously in a setting & subject matter that she cares about. It is this passion & her ability to teach her reader something about what is for many an obscure piece of history while never ever sacrificing her narrative thread is truly admirable.The mystery here is deep with enough twists & turns to keep you wondering & reading. Wonderful book - highly recommended
    • 4/5
      When miner Mick Prentice disappeared in the 1980s it was commonly believed that he had broken ranks with striking miners and headed for greener pastures, leaving behind a wife and young daughter. Twenty years later, Mick’s daughter must find a donor for her dying child, and finding Mick alive is her last chance. Meanwhile, a journalist on holiday in Tuscany uncovers a key piece of evidence in an unsolved kidnapping case. Gaining access to the reclusive and extremely wealthy father of the kidnapped woman, the investigative journalist has the scoop of her life. DI Karen Pirie finds herself with pieces from both cold case puzzles. McDermid, author of the Wire in the Blood series of mysteries, has produced another quality nail-biter with A Darker Domain.
    • 2/5
      It may have been a mistake to read "A Dark Domain" as close to the new Laura Lippman novel as I did. Lippman's stories always set my expectations bar high for mystery stories. I really did think Val McDermid had it in her to compete with Lippman. I consumed "A Place of Execution" a few years ago, but I have to be honest that McDermid's novels since then have been rather hit or miss for me. Chalk "A Dark Domain" up as a miss.