Rating: 
Summary: Well done.
Review: Usually I avoid the British mystery genre. While "A Place of Execution" by Val McDermid was nominated for the 2001 Best Novel Edgar, it was the high praise from Michael Connelly and Steve Hamilton that compelled me to read it.It is an excellent police procedural, albeit quite Dickensian. The two protagonists are skillfully drawn as are the secondary cast members. And you are realistically transported to the English country villages of the early sixties---with some great pop culture references as well. The plot proceeds at a deliberate pace due to much backtracking. That is very helpful due to the number of important bit players. The book requires effort on the part of the reader, and it does pay off. Overall I thought it could have been shorter and am not driven to read more of her books. Back to Michael Connelly and Steve Hamilton.
Rating: 
Summary: Compelling and Haunting . .
Review: The ending of this book is truly a surprise. Enjoy it as a great british procedural and village mystery,and then take pleasure in the character study that unfolds. Like Thomas Cook and P.D. James, McDermid manages to give you penetrating portraits of chracter and moral choices while constructing a tight mystery. Well worth your time.
Rating:
Summary: Elegant and Sinister
Review: I am not usually satisfied with framing devices, the technique whereby the main plot is inserted within a narrative recounted years or decades later. Barbara Vine is the undoubted master of this device in the mystery genre and others rarely meet the challenge. Val McDermid, however, gives Vine a run for her money in "A Place of Execution." The tale involves a horrific crime perpetrated in the 1960s that reverberates decades later: the disappearance of a beautiful adolescent girl in a feudal-style village amidst a rash of other disappearances. The crime baffles local police, partly because a blizzard buries much potential evidence. The tightly-knit villagers' taciturnity adds an additional impediment to the investigation. A trial proceeds, without a corpus dilecti, but with an execution, as promised by the title. Nearly four decades later, new evidence surfaces and the major players in the earlier mystery must confront the heirs and descendants of the victims in a shocking denoument. I have read several novels by McDermid, including "Mermaids Singing" and "Killing the Shadows," but this one remains my favorite so far. I'm looking forward to reading her other novels and have already added her to my pantheon of favorite mystery novelists: Ruth Rendell, Patricial Highsmith, Reginald Hill, Colin Dexter, Robert Baranrd, P.D. James, Minette Walters and Elizabeth George
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Reading for Mystery Buffs
Review: I like to keep it plain and simple. Once in a while I like to take a break from NonFiction books and read a suspense novel. I found this book one of the best I have read, which is probably in the thousands by now. I highly recommend this book. The twists and turns that Val McDermid creates makes the book a nonstop read.
Rating:
Summary: A Place of Execution
Review: Don't start this book at bedtime. You'll never put it down. A real cliff hanger that keeps you in suspense to the very last page. To people who remember the UK's 'Moors Murders' of the 60's this spine chilling book will bring it all back. A book that makes us all aware that no matter how 'isolated' we are, our kids are vunerable. Definately one of Val McDermid's best works. A hard act to follow.
Rating:
Summary: Well plotted. Mesmerizing.
Review: Having read two other McDermid books (the first two featuring the Tony Hill character), I thought this was her best (to date, anyway). This is a stand-alone book. The rural English atmosphere of the '60s is evoked as are the characters, especially the lead detective, George Bennett. Plus the entire small, secluded town atmosphere. Just relax and let the mystery unravel. The author keeps you guessing until the very end. In short: young girl missing. What REALLY happened to her? (I know it sounds cliched, but McDermid creates a page-turner.) It's my belief that one important trait of good fiction is to make you feel you are THERE. Place of Execution did indeed. I couldn't put it down.
Rating:
Summary: An Amazing Book
Review: I got started on Val McDermid by picking up Mermaids Singing on a whim, loved it, and then read the second book in that series. While I still really enjoy the Tony Hill books, this book is just amazing and I have been telling everyone I know to read it!
Rating:
Summary: It simply doesn't get any better than this...
Review: It simply doesn't get any better than this. Val McDermid is one writer I will never give up on (and she provides scant motivation to do so). This standalone book is densely plotted and moves right along, but the reader needs to take the time to keep track of the many and various village and police department members. By the time you go off the precipice that is the ending of this book, you'll be glad you did. In addition to this book, I'd like to also recommend McDermid's Tony Hill series starting with "The Mermaids Singing" and "The Wire in the Blood". "The Last Temptation" wasn't up to par compared to these, but was readable and it left the door open for yet another book in this fine series so it wasn't all bad. But I'd give "A Place of Execution" six stars if I could. Just super.
Rating: 
Summary: Some supsense but plot full of holes
Review: The book has a promising start and there are some good narrative sections. but the author loses her way through the twists of the story and (too)long 400 pages. The ending was not a total surprise to me and seemed just too soap operatic. But the most serious objection must be the plot which just wasn't credible. The question 'Why would a murderer...?' cropped up now and again
starting just after a few chapters.
Yet the book has evidently been saved from something even more serious - in the author's introduction she states that she was saved by a friend from a serious flaw in the plot!
I was really surprised to see the glowing review extracts from the critics and learn that the book was listed for the British Crime Writers Association's Gold Dagger Award as Best Novel of 1999. Thankfully it didn't win.
Rating:
Summary: Great book!
Review: This was a wonderful book with a fictionalized tie-in with the true life English murders from the 1960's. Surprising twist at the end!
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