Past Lying: The twisty new Karen Pirie thriller, now a major ITV series McDermidov Val (2024)

Edinburgh, haunted by the ghosts of its many writers, is also the cold-case territory of DCI Karen Pirie. She should not be surprised, then, when an author’s manuscript appears to provide a blueprint for an actual crime. Karen cannot ignore its chilling similarities to the unsolved case of Lara Hardie, an Edinburgh University student who vanished from her own doorstep. The manuscript seems to hold the key to discovering what happened to Lara, but its author died before he could finish it. As Karen digs deeper, she uncovers a spiralling game of betrayal and revenge in which lies become indistinguishable from the truth and unexpected twists keep emerging.