Farthing

This was an absolutely brilliantly written work of speculative fiction, looking at a world where Britain and Germany reached a peace agreement in 1941, and the after-effects that that change might have. As you might expect from that premise, this provides rich soil for speculation on the toxicity of evil, on the compromising nature of politics, and on environments that allow prejudice and bigotry to thrive.

What makes Farthing stand above much of the rest of the crowd in the genre, though, is that while all that stuff is there, it's all in the background. Walton puts a murder mystery at the centre of the story, and while that plot intertwines with the thematic elements, it always stays interesting enough that our thoughts are always with the actions of Carmichael and the Khan family rather than getting too far into speculative navel gazing.