A Darker Domain by Val McDermid

 

Detective Karen Pirie is in limbo at the police station.  She headed up the case that sent the former superintendent of the station to jail for murder and has now been shunted aside as the head of the Cold Care Review Team.  Her new supervisor is not sure what to make of her but he knows he doesn't like what he sees.  Unfortunately, he has to depend on her when two cases show up at the same time.

Back in 1984, a sensational case happened in this rural locality.  The daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Scotland, Sir Broderick Maclennan Grant, was kidnapped along with her infant son.  During the ransom payoff things went badly and the daughter was killed, her son never found.  Now new evidence has shown up in the case and it has landed in Pirie's lap.

At the same time another cold case from the same time period has been reported.  Misha Gibson shows up at the police station to report her father missing.  Not unusual except that he went missing twenty-two years before and this is the first report filed.  Misha's mother always assumed Mick Prentice ran out on the marriage and his daughter and they learned to live with that.  His best friend went missing at the same time and it was during the coal strikes when society was disordered.  They figured Mick just upped stakes and went to find a better life somewhere else but now Misha's son is sick and needs a blood donor to have a chance at getting better so Misha wants him found.  Can Karen juggle the two cases and solve them both?

This is the second Karen Pirie novel in the series.  She is an interesting character, a confident woman who isn't described as the most attractive woman anyone has ever seen but the average woman most of us are used to seeing in daily life.  Pirie is intelligent and insightful and has the determination and force to follow a case from start to finish no matter the price she has to pay with her superiors in order to get to the solution.  As such, she is a breath of fresh air.  The cases are intriguing and the resolution is satisfactory.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.