The Distant Echo
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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 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
‘A classic … McDermid pulls out all the stops. Impeccable’ Guardian
‘A few more sly, old-fashioned whodunits like this and she’ll join the sturdy ranks of the queens of crime, on course to become Dame Val or Baroness McDermid’ Sunday Times
‘She has created some of the most appealing figures in current crime fiction. Val McDermid has used the crime genre to write a novel that, above everything else, celebrates life and loyalty’ TLS
‘A real page-turner and another McDermid triumph’ Observer
‘A powerful story of murder and revenge … an exciting page-turner’ Sunday Telegraph
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Distinctly less gruesome than some of McDermid's novels (that's a good thing, as far as I'm concerned), "The Distant Echo" is a cleverly plotted and thoroughly believable read. The characters are engaging and convincingly drawn, and it's nice to see Val setting a novel in her native Scotland for once!
The story spans 25 years, beginning in 1978 when four students - the "laddies fi' Kirkcaldy" - at St Andrews University stumble across the body of a young woman while walking home from the pub late one snowy night. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time, coupled with the inability of the police to identify any other suspects, has catastrophic consequences for the four young men. The fallout from the unsolved murder of Rosie Duff reverberates down the years and comes back to haunt Alex, Ziggy, Davey and Tom in ways they could never have imagined.
"The Distant Echo" is a gripping read, with an excellent plot and believable characterisation, and I for one had no inkling of the eventual denouement!
Highly recommended.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
My first encounter with Val McDermid, on a recommendation. And it wasn't bad, but I don't think she's in the same league as the likes of Ian Rankin or Graham Hurley in this genre. The characters are surprisingly two-dimensional, and some of the dialogue used to establish character lacks conviction - the spirituality of the Christian is particularly unconvincing and stereotyped, you hear more convincing Godspeak on the God Channel. I also found it hard to believe that police procedures could be as shoddy as this plot demands that they are. All that said, it was an enjoyable, engrossing read that took me through several twists and turns, while never really delivering against the puff on the jacket or in the reviews on this page.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book is very reminiscent of McDermid's most successful book to date, the multi-award winning A PLACE OF EXECUTION. The similarity lies in the way the story is presented in two parts, the first half dealing with the emotion of the crime as it happens and the second half fast forwards to the present and deals with the fallout. In this case we are taken back to 1978 before completing the story in 2003. On the surface it's a simple mystery, a girl is raped, stabbed and left for dead in the small university village of St Andrews in Scotland. But as the story unfolds, the consequences prove that the tragedy is much more insidious and far reaching.
Part 1 of the story begins with four young men walking home drunk from a party, late one night. The men met on their first day of high school and have stood by each other throughout their school life. They have now moved on to university and have remained inseparable. They each have nicknames bestowed upon them and it is by these names that we know of them throughout the book. For the record, their names and nicknames are Alex Gilbey (aka Gilly), Sigmund Malkiewicz (aka Ziggy), David Kerr (aka Mondo) and Tom Mackie (aka Weird). During their walk home they literally stumble upon the body of Rosie Duff, a barmaid from the local pub. She had been stabbed in the stomach and was barely clinging to life.
Faced with the dying girl, Alex is sent to get help and finds PC James Lawson who raises the alarm, but by the time they get back to Rosie, she had already died. The 4 friends start out as the only witnesses to the murder, but soon become the only suspects, thanks to two facts. The police have a distinct lack of evidence and, while being questioned all four of them withhold information that they think is unrelated to the case and would only serve to get them in trouble.
Although they all insist they had nothing to do with Rosie's death, news soon leaks that the police had questioned them and people start voicing their suspicions. The rest of the first part of the story sees the slow disintegration of the boy's friendship as the case drags on with the finger of blame continually pointed at them. They have to endure malicious gossip and rumour as well as physical and verbal abuse. They even get to the point where they begin to become suspicious of each other and start to blame one another for getting them into their predicament.
It's in the second half of the book (Part 2) that the story really comes to life as plot twists are thrown in one on top of the other. It's 25 years later and we get to see what became of the four friends and how their nightmare experience has affected their lives. We also get a complete change in tempo as the style of story jumps from police procedural to that of a thriller. McDermid does a splendid job of feeding out a little bit of the murder investigation, which has been reopened as part of the Chief Constable's cold case review programme, while supplying an intensely thrilling subplot to keep things jumping.
THE DISTANT ECHO shows how easily a weak friendship can be torn apart under pressure, but at the same time it highlights the strength of true friendship. I found it to be compulsive reading thanks to its multi-dimensional story line. It's more than just a murder mystery, although it's a fine murder mystery just the same, it's a book that deals with relationships (all sorts of relationships, by the way) and their survival through all sorts of adversity.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
It was glued to my hand for two days
I was riveted by this tale of the 4 friends who find a dying girl as students and turn from witnesses to suspects. Read more
Published 2 months ago by C. Wilson
A well paced thriller (3.5 stars)
This is the third McDermid book I have read, and the second one I have actually enjoyed (I gave up on the dire `Trick or Treat! Read more
Published 2 months ago by Nicola F (Nic)
The Distant Echo
The downside to being a murder mystery reader is that I always try to guess who the murderer is. I did this (admittedly just a stab in the dark) with this book and the belief... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Anne E O
Briliant
This arrived as usual Amazon standard the very next day
As a stand alone I was dubious as I do like the Tony Hill series ............... Read more
As a stand alone I was dubious as I do like the Tony Hill series ............... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Ms. K. Norman
Another good read
I am a big fan of the'Tartan Noir' genre, and Val McDermid in particular. I have read all of the Tony Hill books and decided to read some of her others. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Mrs O
Great Read
This was my first Val McDermid book and I was not disappointed. The pace of the book increased as the pages turned and I read too long into the night!! Read more
Published 11 months ago by Di
good developement of relationships
The first book by this author that I have read and although i guessed who dun it quite early on this book was about so much more than that and I thought that the development of the... Read more
Published 18 months ago by francofilly
No one escapes the past
`The distant echo of faraway voices boarding faraway trains,' Down In The Tube Station At Midnight, The Jam. Read more
Published 18 months ago by Paul D Brazill
Enjoyable read
This is my first Val McDermid book and whilst I struggled to get into it, once in, I really enjoyed it. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Jackie
Enjoyable page turner
I really enjoyed this book. The changes in time period kept it interesting and I had to engage with the book to remember who the characters were. Read more
Published 21 months ago by indiemandm
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