RogerBW's Blog

Silent Voices, Ann Cleeves 02 November 2024

2011 contemporary police mystery, fourth in Cleeves' Vera Stanhope series. Stanhope, reluctantly attending the local gym, finds a woman's body in the steam room.

Once again everyone has secrets. The second viewpoint is from a social worker, then woman in charge of the case when a mother drowned her son, who has fled to a village in the middle of nowhere to try to get away from the publicity—and the dead woman was her boss at the time. There's a lot of thrashing around and going down blind alleys, and meanwhile the survivors try to get on with their lives; but murder casts a long shadow.

Cleeves effectively makes Stanhope an unpleasant but sympathetic character: she knows she's a mess, but she's good at what she does, and if she thinks something other than bluntness is needed, she'll send in one of her subordinates instead.

I did think there was one obvious extra detail, entirely consistent with the resolution, which nobody worked out (gung Fvzba Ryvbg unq npghnyyl xvyyrq uvf yvggyr oebgure, naq gung uvf zbgure xarj vg naq jnf pbirevat sbe uvz), and I was a little disappointed that even the possibility wasn't mentioned; but the game of deduction was fairly played, and I continue to enjoy Cleeves' plotting and characterisation even as I have to regard the possibility of a genuinely sympathetic character as increasingly unlikely.

I don't think there's any special reason to start here, but if you've enjoyed others in this series this offers the same recipe: complex people, lots of buried secrets, and occasional lyrical descriptions of the outdoors.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

Previous in series: Hidden Depths | Series: Vera Stanhope

Add A Comment

Your Name
Your Email
Your Comment

Your submission will be ignored if any field is left blank, but your email address will not be displayed. Comments will be processed through markdown.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime crystal cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 essen 2024 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2021 hugo 2022 hugo 2023 hugo 2024 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1