Brilliant new psychological thriller from the acclaimed author of Black Dog and Blood on the Tongue. Withens is a small village in the Peak District, but it's no idyll. Dark and dour, it's troubled by theft and vandalism, mostly generated by local family-from-hell, the Oxleys. Now it is the focus of a murder investigation -- a young man's body has been found on the desolate moors nearby, and the man is an Oxley. DC Ben Cooper is trying to crack the case and to do that he must crack this clannish family. On top of that, his difficult boss, Detective Diane Fry, is also in Withens on business -- one Emma Renshaw, a student who vanished two years ago. Some ominous new evidence relating to Emma has turned up, but her parents are convinced she is still alive and act accordingly -- and very strangely. So, with one murder and one as yet unsolved disappearance, Withens' reputation for grimness is growing. And it looks like things are only going to get darker...