The first half of book is the "memoir" of Roddy, who gives the story of how he came to murder Lachlan(?) and his children.

After finishing this it seems like a very straightforward open and shut case. Roddy admits he's done it and is completely prepared to face the consequences. And from the memoir there seems no doubt that he did it. Nothing strange or odd in the memoir apart perhaps from hints that Roddy is a little bit odd - he finds sick animals and tries to nurse them back to health but they mostly die; he behaves a bit strangely on a hunt where he makes lots of noise to scare a stag that the party were about to shoot.

So at this stage I'm mostly interested to find how it could possibly be doubted that Roddy is the murderer - although, judging by the fact that we're only halfway through the book, there must be some kind of twist.

The second half is "contemporaneous" documents from the time of the murders: autopsy notes and then account of criminal anthropologist who takes an interest in the case, and then a journal of Roddy's trial.

The trial wasn't that interesting - basically they just argued about whether he could be not guilty by reason of insanity and about whether he was mad or not.

There was a slightly interesting bit was alternative theory of why he did the killing which was advanced by psychologist(?) who suggested really the main victim was the daughter Flora who Roddy had had a thing for, and Roddy had invented the story of the feud with his father as a cover story.

But the trial ended and he was found guilty and hanged.

Now, if this really was a found document that the author had come across while researching his family tree then it is sort of a interesting historical record. But if it was just a fiction and the author has wrapped that in a "here’s what I found" narrative then it was pretty weak.

Without knowing whether it's true or fiction it's hard to know whether it was interesting or weak. I suppose if it's real then it is interesting; if it's made up it's arguably impressive. But I didn't think the actual story was much good - I'd been expecting some reveal at the end and there wasn't one. And I think it was made up so it's a disappointing book ie he could be excused the lack of reveal if it had been a true story/actual real found MS.

According to this author interview, it's fiction based on a different real life case where there was a confession published.

But the "found documents" are all invented I think, so perhaps it is an impressive construction of what might have happened, but tbh I found it rather dull and was nonplussed by the attention the novel received.

Completed : ??-Aug-2018 (audiobook)