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| The Distant Echo | 
 enlarge | Author: Val Mcdermid
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Category: Book
List Price: £6.99
Buy Used: £0.01
You Save: £6.98 (100%)
New (32) from £1.36
Avg. Customer Rating:  34 reviews
Sales Rank: 14520
Media: Paperback
Pages: 576
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7 x 4.2 x 1.5
ISBN: 0007217161
EAN: 9780007217168
ASIN: 0007217161
Publication Date: February 6, 2006
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Almost Like New paperback Copy. Book may contain one notable sign of wear. Otherwise of New quality. FAST DISPATCH.
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Val McDermid's The Distant Echo is, even more so than with her previous work, a masterpiece of trickery and misdirection. In 1978, four male students find the body of Rosie Duff half-buried in the snow and their lives are variously damaged by the suspicion that falls on them when the murder is never solved; a quarter of a century later, the case is reopened and suddenly the quartet start to be killed one after the other. This is an effective thriller because it is so intelligent about the ways in which time changes things--secrets that seemed important become trivial and investigative techniques become ever more accurate. It is also intelligent about the ways in which things do not change--the friendships of the four men persist even when one becomes a fundamentalist preacher and another a post-modern literary theorist. Unusually for McDermid, this is a very Scots book as well--the investigating officers Maclennan and Lawson are very much men of a particular time and place. McDermid has a real sense of how to make forensic details count in a murder story--she also, more importantly, has a heart--this is a novel that makes us care passionately about victims and suspects alike. --Roz Kaveney
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| Customer Reviews: Read 29 more reviews...
 The Distant Echo November 2, 2008
Frustrating read. Seriously overlong the author could have easily lost 100 pages from the manuscript. At times her prose was cliched. The biggest problem was the pace of the novel. It is slow and by the end you may not care who the murderer was or what happened. I think if the book had been structured differently, e.g. set in the present with flashbacks to the past, it would have had more pace and still carried the psychological depth that the author was obviously aiming. As it stands it's not a bad read, just mediocre.
Good Val, but a bit too serious August 26, 2008
I picked this up for $1.50 in a charity shop as I was eager to give her a go and it was well worth the time and nominal fee.
Really well structured, original and gripping.
I had the culprit on my suspects list towards the end of the first half but was skillfully sidetracked by other developments in the second half. Even if I had stuck to my guns I wouldn't have predicted the modus operandi.
Some of the dialogue is a little wooden and is missing some more authentic dark humour; that I would imagine would be more representative of four student 'laddies fi' Kirkcaldy.' E.g. Taking a leaf out of Stuart MacBride's Logan books. I know there is more chance to develop characters in a series but I think there would have been scope within the 500+ pages in this book to make it a little less serious.
This notwithstanding, I stand by my 4 star rating and would consider another Val McDermid if the price was right!
Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders from the Dark Side of the Moon February 9, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Val McDermid grew up in Kirkcaldy, a small mining community on the east coast of Scotland and studied English at Oxford University. The books she has written featuring Tony Hill and Carol Jordan have provided the basis for the popular "Wire on the Blood" television series. Her novels have won a number of awards, including the Macavity award, the Anthony Award and Grand Prix des Romans d'Aventure. "The Distant Echo", meanwhile, has picked up the Sherlock and Barry Awards and has been nominated for the Theakston's Old Peculiar Crime Novel of the Year. It is one of her stand-alone books, was first published in 2003 and is largely set in Scotland.
The story begins in December 1978 with four students at St. Andrew's University staggering home together after an end-of-term party. Alex "Gilly" Gilbey, Sigmund "Ziggy" Malkiewicz, Tom "Weird" Mackie and Davey "Mondo" Kerr grew up in the nearby village of Kirkcaldy and - despite differences of opinion about David Bowie and Pink Floyd - have been close friends since school. Taking their usual short-cut over Hallow Hill, a hidden tree-root and a shove form Weird sees Alex literally stumbling across something he'd rather have avoided. Rosie Duff, the Lammas Bar's nineteen year-old barmaid, has been raped, stabbed and is barely alive when Alex lands on her. Ziggy, a medical student, tries to keep her alive while Alex runs for help - however, by the time he returns with PC Jimmy Lawson, Rosie has died. Worse is to come : DI Barney Maclennan, who leads the subsequent murder investigation, views the four friends as the prime suspects rather than key witnesses. The police's attempts at an investigation, and their suspicions about the students, become common knowledge : the early part of the book covers the initial investigation and its effects on the four friends. However, they aren't charged, and the case never comes to court.
In late 2003, Fife Police announce they are to look into Rosie's murder again as part of a full-scale cold case review. While the Laddies fi' Kirkcaldy were never charged, there are some who are still convinced of their guilt - including Rosie's brothers, a pair with a violent record. By now, Alex is living in Edinburgh, Mondo is in Glasgow, while Ziggy and Weird are living in America. On the twenty-fifth anniversary of Rosie's murder, a date Alex has never been able to forget, he receives a phone call : one of his three friends is dead, killed in what turns out to be an arson attack. Attending the funeral, he notices a wreath made of rosemary and white roses. The message, unsigned, reads "Rosemary for Remembrance". Alex, remembering that Rosie's full name was Rosemary Duff, has started feeling somewhat edgy...
This is the first novel by McDermid I've read, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's difficult not to feel sorry for, and worried about, Alex and his friends bearing in mind what the investigation is doing to them, the strain it puts on their friendship and how they are widely viewed as pariahs. The book features plenty of twists and turns, is very easily read and is one I would highly recommend.
Well written as ever - but too easily solved. November 1, 2006
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
It's hard being a reader of crime fiction, particularly a whodunit. You spend a whole book trying to work out where it's all leading, and then you get to the denouement to find you were completely wrong and didn't see it coming at all. That's what makes some books so good, right?
Well, yes. Unfortunately this doesn't take into account that when you are actually successful in working out 'whodunit', it's a disappointment. It's almost a battle of wits between author and reader, and if the author fails to outfox you, you feel let down.
I didn't work out the solution to this from an early stage, but as the book developed it gradually began to slot into place, and I hoped in vain that I was wrong about the identity of the killer. It's a shame, because this book is as well written as any of Val McDermid's other novels. She is a hugely talented writer and the only thing that prevents me from giving this one five stars is that it was too predictable.
Read this anyway, and try not to work out the solution. While it's not quite as good as the Tony Hill or Kate Brannigan series, it's still a very decent crime novel.
Well written as ever - but too easily solved November 1, 2006
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
It's hard being a reader of crime fiction, particularly a whodunit. You spend a whole book trying to work out where it's all leading, and then you get to the denouement to find you were completely wrong and didn't see it coming at all. That's what makes some books so good, right?
Well, yes. Unfortunately this doesn't take into account that when you are actually successful in working out 'whodunit', it's a disappointment. It's almost a battle of wits between author and reader, and if the author fails to outfox you, you feel let down.
I didn't work out the solution to this from an early stage, but as the book developed it gradually began to slot into place, and I hoped in vain that I was wrong about the identity of the killer. It's a shame, because this book is as well written as any of Val McDermid's other novels. She is a hugely talented writer and the only thing that prevents me from giving this one five stars is that it was too predictable.
Read this anyway, and try not to work out the solution. While it's not quite as good as the Tony Hill or Kate Brannigan series, it's still a very decent crime novel.
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