Out of Bounds

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When she and her colleague begin to delve beneath the surface,what they discover takes them on a diverging course that makes them privy to the fury and humiliation of fellow officers,the ire of their commanding officers,and the wilful determination of the person responsible for the deaths of innocent people. A massive thanks to Grove Atlantic and Netgalley for an ARC of this book! When I had put my request in to review, I was on tenterhooks waiting to see if it would be approved – when it was approved….well I think there may have been a *happy dance* …ok, there was! The 2nd cold case is one in which 4 people lost their lives aboard a small engine plane 22 years ago. The consensus is that terrorists blew the plane up. That explanation seemed to satisfy almost everyone...everyone except Inspector Pirie.

I loved the authenticity of the police work and hierarchy within this novel. The process and forensics fascinated me and reminded me of a few real life cases I had read about in University involving familial DNA. Awesome! The Historic Crime Unit / cold cases interest me too, so learning that this was the focus of this book…well I just may have Eeeeeek’d!! Detective Chief Inspector Karen Pirie walks the streets of Leith in the small hours. She cannot sleep as her lover and colleague, Phil Parhatka, was killed in the last outing in this series ( The Skeleton Road). [1] At night she encounters displaced Syrian refugees in alleyways and under bridges gathered together to try and be a community, as since coming to Scotland, they have nowhere to meet up. McDermid melds the political thriller with the police procedural for an intense novel that . . . feels both intensely personal and global . . . Karen . . . once again proves herself a formidable character worthy of her own series.” Associated Press on The Skeleton RoadOn her 30th novel . . . none is more deserving of the queen-of-crime mantle than Val McDermid . . . I would like to see a great deal more of DCI Pirie.”— Irish Times Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival. McDermid has been writing as a full time author since the success of her initial novels and she spends equal amounts of time in her homes in Edinburgh and Cheshire. She hails from the Kirkcaldy town of Fife in Scotland and completed her college studies from the St. Hilda’s College in Oxford. Ruth Lawson (13 December 2012). "Ink thrown at author Val McDermid during Sunderland book signing". Journal Live. Archived from the original on 8 April 2013 . Retrieved 26 December 2012. Karen’s character is the reason to read this series- there’s just something about her that seems so real. She is intelligent, strong, and complex with a bit of snark mixed in, and I especially love her relationship with Jason (aka “The Mint”).

On 23 October 2016 McDermid married her partner of two years, Jo Sharp, a professor of geography at the University of Glasgow. [34] [35] This was a fantastic story,one that I was completely bewitched by. The writing was so endearingly crafted that,by story's end,I felt that I knew and would recognise Karen and Jason if I met them on the street! Valarie McDermid, FRSE , FRSL (born 4 June 1955) is a Scottish crime writer, best known for a series of novels featuring clinical psychologist Dr. Tony Hill, in a grim sub-genre known as Tartan Noir. Val McDermid ends Raith Rovers support over David Goodwillie deal". BBC News. 1 February 2022 . Retrieved 1 February 2022.

Customer reviews

A decent plot that is not straight forward but excellently told and there are the usual twists and turns that make the difference between average thrillers and very good ones. Out of Bounds is a 2016 crime drama novel by Scottish crime writer Val McDermid. The novel is set during 2016 but because the main detective is in the Historic Case Unit (HCU) the crimes being investigated were actually committed in 1994 and 1996. The best recent thrillers – review roundup". the Guardian. 7 September 2021 . Retrieved 16 April 2022. RSE Welcomes 60 New Fellows" (Press release). Royal Society of Edinburgh. 15 February 2017 . Retrieved 28 March 2017. Kudos, Madam McDermid for another wonderful novel. I hope you will keep writing Pirie novels. I am curious, since you have a number of successful series, if you will entertain a crossover at some point. Brilliant if you would consider it for us fans!

Val McDermid is a favourite author of mine. Not only do I love her books and the way they have been brought to life for TV, I actually really enjoy listening to her talk. She inspires me with the way she comes up with new ideas and story-lines although I will admit, it was not until I had watched my first episode of Wire in the Blood that I discovered her as an author.Readers will easily connect with Karen, whose unwavering confidence is tempered by a strong dose of kindness and sense of justice . . . Satisfying investigative detail, swift pacing, and realistic mysteries steeped in the intricacies of Scottish law; a sure fit for fans of Tana French and of Denise Mina’s Alex Morrow series.”― Booklist (starred review) More silence. Clearly she was going to have to work at extracting information from Sergeant Torrance. 'An offer of help always gets my day off to a good start. What is it you think you've got?' I'm getting addicted to Karen Pirie, a focused, deep thinking detective who refuses to be bullied or indeed intimidated by senior (male) officers; who fosters and grows a network of women friends in labs, courts, tech etc.; a woman who mentors and strongly supports her loyal team of one, working class Jason; and this is where you know it's fiction, a detective who can't stand Trump or racists, and likes, and goes out of her way to support immigrant communities! Oh, and this was a great dual-case with some really interesting Scotland set police procedural. So I've now read two books in this series, and they both get 8 out of 12, Four Stars from me.

Still Pirie is fierce and jumps into the case with no holds barred. There are unusual twists that complicate the investigation. She also stumbles into another cold case, a small airplane bombed years ago supposedly by the IRA and all four passengers were killed. Pirie's investigation negates the Irish connection and leads to another murder just committed. I cared about Karen,her sorrow and insomnia as she traversed the lonely streets of Edinburgh each night,the unequal but strangely intimate partnership that began to grow,right before our eyes,between herself and Jason,and the people she called friends. Jason Murray – “The Mint” — awwww….I don’t have a maternal bone in my body, but this guy…I just wanted to mother him. He is the other half of the HCU ( a two person Unit) and is so trust-worthy it could end up being his down-fall. Karen works around his flaws, protects him while trying to teach him but I suspect there is only so far she will go…she may just need to shove him out of the nest and hope he learns to fly, not fall! Sally Rowena Munt (1994). Murder by the Book: Feminism and the Crime Novel. Routledge. p. 67. ISBN 0415109191. Hannah Ellis-Petersen (25 August 2015). "Val McDermid: 'I'm working class – I wouldn't be able to go to Oxford now' ". The Guardian.Karen is very good at what she does. She never shies away from a difficult question or a seemingly impossible case. The latest case belonged to Inspector Detective Noble. An apparent suicide of one of the sons whose mother was killed on board that ill fated plane. Karen's idea of a professional detective did not include Noble. Although officially this wasn't Karen's case she decided to do her own bit of investigation. This may not sit well with Chief Constable Simon Lees but that never stopped Karen when she had her mind set on finding answers that others had overlooked. Internationally bestselling author Val McDermid is one of our finest crime writers, whose gripping, impeccably plotted novels have garnered millions of readers worldwide. In her latest, Out of Bounds, she delivers a riveting cold case novel featuring detective Karen Pirie. An] engaging new novel...McDermid’s 30th novel offers fascinating insights into the ethical dilemmas thrown up by advances in forensic science”― Sunday Times (UK) Meanwhile, Karen Pirie finds herself irresistibly drawn to another mystery that she has no business investigating, a mystery that has its roots in a terrorist bombing two decades ago. And again, she finds that nothing is as it seems…