About The Book

Time of Death is the astonishing thirteenth Tom Thorne novel from British crime master Mark Billingham, a gripping story of kidnapping, the tabloid press, and a frightening case of mistaken identity. Tom Thorne is on holiday with his girlfriend DS Helen Weeks, when two girls are abducted in Helen’s hometown of Polesford, Warwickshire. When a body is discovered and a man is arrested, Helen recognizes the suspect’s wife as an old school friend and returns home for the first time in twenty-five years to lend her support. As Helen faces up to a past she has tried desperately to forget and a media storm engulfs the town, Thorne becomes convinced that, despite overwhelming evidence of his guilt, the police have got the wrong man. There is still an extremely clever killer on the loose and a missing girl who Thorne believes might still be alive.

Praise

“Billingham conjures many moods in this suspenseful thriller . . . This is a multilayered, expertly crafted look at the many moving parts of an investigation and the terror unleashed by a crafty killer.” —Joanne Wilkinson, Booklist (starred review)

“DI Tom Thorne and his lover, DS Helen Weeks, return to Helen’s hated hometown in Warwickshire to confront some ugly accusations and some even uglier secrets. . . . What lingers in the memory is the group portrait of the Polesford locals brutally closing ranks against a man they’re certain deserves to die.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Builds to a surprising and satisfying climax.” —Publishers Weekly

“Morse, Rebus, and now Thorne. The next superstar detective is already with us—don’t miss him.” —Lee Child

“Billingham is a world-class crime writer and Tom Thorne is a wonderful creation. Rush to read these books.” —Karin Slaughter

“With each of his books, Mark Billingham gets better and better. These are stories and characters you don’t want to leave.” —Michael Connelly

“Clever and inventive.” —Financial Times

Awards

Longlisted for the 2016 Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year
One of Entertainment Weekly‘s “10 Great Summer Thrillers’
One of the Guardian‘s “Best Recent Crime Novels’
A Telegraph Best Crime Book of the Year
To be Adapted into a TV Drama Series by the BBC

Excerpt

On the screen, a young reporter in a smart coat and thick scarf talked directly to camera. She spoke, suitably grim-faced yet evidently excited at breaking the news about this latest “significant development.” Behind her, almost certainly gathered together by the film crew for effect, a small group of locals jostled for position in a small market square that Helen Weeks knew well.

This was the town in which she had grown up.

The reporter continued, talking over the same video package that had run the night before: a ragged line of officers in highvis jackets moving slowly across a dark field; a distraught looking couple being comforted by relatives; a different but equally distressed couple being bundled through a scrum of journalists brandishing cameras and microphones. The reporter said that, according to sources close to the investigation, a local man in his thirties had been identified as the suspect currently in custody. She gave the man’s name. She said it again, nice and slowly. “Police,” she said, “have refused to confirm or deny that Stephen Bates is the man they are holding.”

“Ouch,” Thorne said.

“Right now there’s a Senior Investigating Officer ripping some gobshite a new arsehole.”

“Leak could have come from anywhere,” Helen said.

“Not good though, is it?”

“Not a lot anyone can do, not there. Somebody knows somebody who saw him taken to the station, whatever.” Her eyes had not left the screen. “It’s not an easy place to keep secrets.”