LEIGH FORBES: Books of all Sorts

Raven Black

by Ann Cleeves.

Fabulous book, with wonderfully realistic characters, and a story that I couldn’t put down – even when I wasn’t actually reading the book.

Mild-mannered policeman, Jimmy Perez, a native to Fair Isle, is investigating the murder of a teenage girl on Shetland. Everyone thinks the old man did it – especially as everyone assumes he was responsible for the disappearance of another child in the past – but Cleeves weaves such a good plot, the reader can’t help suspecting just about every major character, the old man included. The characterisation is superb, and the scene setting so good I feel like I’ve been in Shetland for the last two days.

I encountered one passage that felt a bit forced, and another where I couldn’t quite work out whose point of view I was supposed be to reading, meaning that the story wasn’t 100% seamless (otherwise there would have been five stars), but those are small gripes compared with the fabulousness of the whole. 

The last line is particularly good, and I can’t wait to read the next in the series. I’m completely hooked.

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