Silent Voices is the 9th book in the modern procedural D.I. Lottie Parker series by Patricia Gibney. Released 5th Feb 2021, it's 436 pages (print edition) and is available in paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats.
This is a well written, competently plotted, and well paced modern murder procedural with a strong female lead end sympathetic ensemble cast. For me the strongest facet of the book is the complex and very twisty plot. Some of the secondary characters are a bit typey and two dimensional, but the interpersonal connections and the way the author draws out and presents the solution to the mystery more than compensates for the rare bits of dialogue that felt a little like window dressing. There are some heavily foreshadowed plot elements which seemed a little odd to me in context (Lottie winds up having dinner with people of interest in the current investigation which was weird, for example).
The story is told in flashbacks with the counterpoint and development of the plot told alternating between the present time (with Lottie's own wedding ceremony in crisis because of the disappearance/abduction of the groom) and the beginning of the case a week earlier with a series of murders.
Four stars. I would recommend it to fans of modern thriller/procedurals. There is strong language as well as graphic sexual content, so readers should be aware of that if it's problematic. (It's not egregious, and it's pivotal to the plot).
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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