The Literate Kitty

"Desperate times call for desperate measures."   We've all heard that... but what, precisely, qualifies as "desperate times"? And, more importantly, what "desperate measures" do we find acceptable?    Such questions—and eventually a few answers—lie at the heart of Scottish crime novelist Val McDermid's  A Darker Domain .     The story centers around a small Scottish police force's Cold Case team, as new evidence in one  very  cold case (going back more than 20 years) comes to light, and another, "new" case (also 20-odd years old) is reported for the first time.    The lead detective in charge of the team—Detective Inspector Karen Pirie—has her hands full with the two cases.   The first involves a long-unsolved kidnapping-gone-wrong, in which a wealthy industrialist's daughter and her infant son were held for ransom... only to end in tragedy when the heiress-daughter got killed at the hand-off and the baby disappeared.    W...

It seems highly likely that Deanna Raybourn grew up on a steady diet of deliciously-atmospheric gothic novels... the ones peopled by intelligent young heroines--hampered only by the (mis)fortune of their sex... dark, brooding, mysterious men (not- quite heroes, but fantastically appealing, nonetheless)... and a certain number of crazed (whether caused by a chance of birth, serious illness, or being forced to endure one too many personal/emotional traumas) characters... all of whom can be seen, by turns, milling or skulking about one stately manor house or another (which are always replete, naturally, with a surfeit of dark, draughty corners and a multitude of well-hidden secrets), or scurrying along busy city sidewalks with some stealthy plan in mind.  Yes, I think such novels must have been akin to mother’s milk for the supremely-talented Ms. Raybourn, since favorable comparisons to the like seem inevitably to spring to mind when reading her books.  Raybourn’s suspenseful se...