Watching Trees Grow

A novella.

Watching Trees Grow is an alternative history story, set on an Earth where the remnants of the Roman Empire carry on as a world government, and people have very long lives. It's a whodunit detective story, following the murder of a student in Oxford, at the beginning of the industrial age. As everyone has a life expectancy measurable in centuries, murder is regarded as an appalling crime. The story follows the detective across several centuries as more and more forensic science is developed and techniques improved until they reach the point where the crime can be solved.