Silent Voices by Ann CleevesMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
As usual the author’s almost abrupt attitude towards her portrayal of the character of Vera Stanhope, makes no bones about her appearance and her method of interviewing people. She comes across as being a large woman, plain in appearance and very unstylishly dressed. She is still very fond of alcohol and often unpleasantly direct when asking questions of witnesses or suspects. We find her swimming lengths of a health club’s pool at the start of the story, due to her doctor’s advice about changing her lifestyle to one that is healthier.
When Vera discovers a woman’s dead body in the steam room of the health club we know we are at the beginning of her next new murder case. The victim, Jenny Lister, is a social worker and the subsequent investigation will occupy the rest of the novel. Sometimes Cleeves tells the story from the POV of her sergeant Joe Ashworth but in the third person generally. It is obvious throughout that Vera is pulling the strings and I felt it was unfair on Joe to make him seem so naïve. In this novel we start to get an idea of how much Vera thinks of her sergeant and, at the same time, the effect upon his wife with how much extra overtime he is expected to put in to a case. There is also the appearance of Vera’s father’s old Land Rover, breaking the general police rules about the safety of the vehicles used by officers. Cleeves gives the reader a little more information about DI Stanhope’s upbringing from Hector, her widower father. It meant I found more sympathy and understanding for her bluff TV image.
This novel had so many false trails and possible suspects that it makes your head spin at times; just what you want in a good crime thriller. I still am not sure of the eventual motive for the murder – but I suspect that is going to be the situation I will find myself at the end of many more Vera Stanhope novels. Fans of the crime genre will like this book.
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