Past Lying
Cathleen McCarron version

In this latest installment to her acclaimed detective series, internationally bestselling author Val McDermid
returns with DCI Karen Pirie in a propulsive new thriller of deceit and vengeance, set against the disquiet and
investigative challenges of a global pandemic
Hailed as Britain’s “Queen of Crime” (Scotsman), Val McDermid is the award-winning, internationally bestselling
author of over thirty novels that have enthralled readers for the past three decades. The long-awaited seventh
novel in McDermid’s acclaimed Karen Pirie series, Past Lying is a breakneck collision of ego, retribution, and
just how far one will go to settle the score.
It’s April 2020 and Edinburgh is in lockdown, but that doesn’t mean crime takes a holiday. It would seem like
a strange time for a cold case to go hot—the streets all but empty, an hour’s outdoor exercise the maximum
allowed—but when a source at the National Library contacts DCI Karen Pirie’s team about documents in the
archive of a recently deceased crime novelist, it seems it’s game on again. What unspools is a twisted game
of betrayal and revenge, but no one quite expects how many twists it will turn out to have.
Tense, atmospheric, and relentlessly captivating, Past Lying is another winner from Val McDermid, and new
and longtime readers alike will delight in this triumphant return to a stellar series.