Taken from Peter F. Hamilton's short story collection Manhattan in Reverse, Watching Trees Grow is a murder mystery set in alternate Oxford in the 1800s and the continuing investigation that takes place over a two hundred year period.
The lead investigator Edward Raleigh is from one of the 'old' families and will stop at nothing including investigating and invading people's memories to find out who murdered a junior member of his family. His journey takes him across the Solar System through ever evolving technologies and, eventually, to the answers he's been searching for.