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A review by noveldeelights
The Silent Dead by Graham Smith
4.0
Some of you may be familiar with Graham Smith’s other brilliant series featuring Jake Boulder. If you’re not, please go forth and fix the error of your ways or I may just have to stop talking to you 😉. Now though, Graham Smith has decided to walk a different path with a new crime police procedural.
The Silent Dead introduces us to Beth Young, who has just recently started working at the Force Major Investigation Team (FMIT). Beth is indeed young, determined and ambitious. Spurred on by the scars she carries herself, her main focus is justice for the victims and their families whose lives have been changed forever because of a crime.
When the body of a man is found in a derelict mansion, Beth and the rest of the FMIT team face an uphill battle. Who is the victim? Why was his body left in this particular place? What did he do that could possibly warrant such an incredibly gruesome death? Like seriously! This is one of those times where I curse my vivid imagination! Anyway, it becomes clear quite early on that the killer has a plan and they won’t stop until their mission is completed.
The investigation is an utterly frustrating one, a feeling I very much shared with the team. I wasn’t able to connect the dots at all and was left to think I was missing vital clues somewhere. But Beth has an uncanny way of thinking slightly out of the box, which is pretty admirable. Despite that, I didn’t really like her all that much, although I can’t quite put my finger on the why. That said though, I really enjoyed following a character at the start of their career as opposed to an experienced and often disillusioned DI.
The Silent Dead has a great plot and crisp writing, as I’ve come to expect from Graham Smith. Tense and compelling, it creates the perfect foundation for a brand-new series and is an exciting and brilliant first instalment. Beth has a rather different background than most of the detectives we tend to meet in this genre and it will be interesting to see how that develops. If at all. I can’t wait to see where Graham Smith takes Beth and this series next.
The Silent Dead introduces us to Beth Young, who has just recently started working at the Force Major Investigation Team (FMIT). Beth is indeed young, determined and ambitious. Spurred on by the scars she carries herself, her main focus is justice for the victims and their families whose lives have been changed forever because of a crime.
When the body of a man is found in a derelict mansion, Beth and the rest of the FMIT team face an uphill battle. Who is the victim? Why was his body left in this particular place? What did he do that could possibly warrant such an incredibly gruesome death? Like seriously! This is one of those times where I curse my vivid imagination! Anyway, it becomes clear quite early on that the killer has a plan and they won’t stop until their mission is completed.
The investigation is an utterly frustrating one, a feeling I very much shared with the team. I wasn’t able to connect the dots at all and was left to think I was missing vital clues somewhere. But Beth has an uncanny way of thinking slightly out of the box, which is pretty admirable. Despite that, I didn’t really like her all that much, although I can’t quite put my finger on the why. That said though, I really enjoyed following a character at the start of their career as opposed to an experienced and often disillusioned DI.
The Silent Dead has a great plot and crisp writing, as I’ve come to expect from Graham Smith. Tense and compelling, it creates the perfect foundation for a brand-new series and is an exciting and brilliant first instalment. Beth has a rather different background than most of the detectives we tend to meet in this genre and it will be interesting to see how that develops. If at all. I can’t wait to see where Graham Smith takes Beth and this series next.