‘The Hanging Valley’ is the 4th book in Peter Robinson’s Inspector Banks series and has Chief Inspector Banks investigating a murder near the Yorkshire village of Swainshead.
Five years earlier there was another murder in the village. It was investigated by Banks’s boss Gristhorpe, but was never solved. Around the same time as the earlier murder, a Swainshead local – Anne Ralston vanished and has not been seen since. Now a decomposing and maggot ridden body has been discovered in the beautiful hanging valley. Could the three events be connected?
It takes a while to identify the body as that of a local who moved to Canada several years ago – Bernie Allen. The locals are very cagey and can’t provide much information. Banks even travels to Canada to find out more.
But, suspicion falls mostly on the Swainshead locals. The Collier brothers – Stephen and Nicky, are the wealthy landowners of the area and Nicky is a complete creep. John Fuller is a farmer. Sam Greenock runs the guesthouse with his wife Katie who has been seriously damaged by her overstrict religious upbringing (she still washes her mouth out with soap if she tells a lie). I’m not sure whether I found Nicky or Sam more unpleasant – I was hoping that they were next on the murderer’s list.
Eventually Banks, mostly partnered by Hatchley manages to dig up motives for the murders and hence find out who committed them. But he is not in time to stop further damage being done.
This is my favourite book of the series so far and I was really able to get into the heads of some of the characters. I found the trip by Banks to Canada a bit off track and the book would probably have read better without it.
I’m looking forward to continuing the series with – ‘Past Reason Hated’.
Book Published 1989