Customer Reviews

Blind to the Bones

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Murder once again visits the Peak District of Derbyshire near Edendale in the 4th book of this terrific series. The members of the Derbyshire Constabulary, E Division are called on to work the case, although Ben Cooper has been loaned out to the Rural Crimes Team and Diane Fry is investigating a 2-year-old missing persons case, separating the duelling coppers.

The story centres around the tiny hamlet of Withens leading both Cooper and Fry there on their separate investigations. The murder victim is a young local man named Neil Granger. Granger is part of a large family that makes up the majority of the residents of Withens. It's Ben's job to interview the residents but like so many isolated close-knit communities they are particularly suspicious of outsiders, and this lot are especially suspicious when it comes to the police. Ben can't help but think they are hiding something but doesn't know what.

Meanwhile, there is one old couple in Withens, the Renshaws, who are more than happy to talk. The problem is, the only topic of conversation is their daughter Emma, who went missing 2 years ago. The Renshaws talk of Emma in the present tense, expecting her to walk through their door at any moment, much to Diane Fry's bemusement.

Because of Ben Cooper's secondment to the Rural Crimes Team, Diane has had to use the ever hungry and source of numerous lighter moments, Gavin Murfin. Murfin is taking an increasingly prominent role as the series progresses and is a nice counterpoint to Fry's more dour by the book attitude.

This series is getting stronger and stronger with each new book and the characters of Ben Cooper and Diane Fry are developing nicely. If you're after an exceedingly enjoyable police procedural, I strongly recommend this one. In my opinion, this is the best of the series so far.

Two years ago, Birmingham student Emma Renshaw went to catch the train to visit her parents in Withens. However, somewhere en route she disappeared without a clue as to what happened to her. Though most people assume she is dead, her frenzied parents fervently believe she is alive and will come home soon. They live life as if Emma is attending school, keeping her room the way she left it and buy her holiday gifts, and maintain her car.

However, murder occurs on the Dark Peak moors near Withens leading to Detective Diane Fry wanting to reopen the cold case of Emma. Meanwhile Diane's peer, Detective Ben Cooper investigates the apparent murder of Neil Oxley, a roommate of Emma's who is also from Withens. The two cases seem to connect, but both detectives struggle with dysfunctional families as the Renshaws refuse to accept their daughter is most likely dead and the Oxleys reject talking to authorities preferring to hide their secrets inside their clandestine clan.

This is an exhilarating believable English police procedural that should provide Stephen Booth with a host of new fans. The story line is fun to follow as the two cops struggle independently with non-cooperating people before their inquiries converge. Following the link, they run into even more disagreeable souls. Readers will take great pleasure in the latest Fry-Cooper novel and search for previous books starring these powerful detectives (see BLOOD ON THE TONGUE).

Harriet Klausner

Not many mysteries/police procedurals can sustain 580+ pages: this is definitely not one of the exceptions. Name of the Rose, for example, runs 600 pages. But with that book there's much more than just a mystery--you're being taken to a very unfamiliar world. There's just too much in Blind to the Bones that really does not need to be present--it doesn't add to the story in any way unless what you want is a book that will carry you through a very long plane trip and then you can leave it behind somewhere.

I found here that I wasn't really engaging with any of the characters--there was not anyone I emphasized with. Some books can make up for shortcomings with a sense of an unusual place or setting, so that problems with character development or dialogue can be at least in part overcome by the setting, such as an interesting historical location. But the locations here are not memorable or very interesting. There are too many threads in the book--some are meaningful, some go nowhere--it's not easy to keep track of them.

Some books I want to reread within a year or two, others I may want to reread--e.g. a book about sailing in the Outer Hebrides. These I keep. Other books I'm pretty sure I will not want to reread, and unfortunately Blind to the Bones will thus be given to my local library.

This is the fourth book in the Ben Cooper/Diane Fry mystery series centering on the murder of a local man and the two year old disappearance of a 19 year old girl in the small hamlet of Withens. The two cases separate our two protagonists - initially. In a word this book was a slog, about half way through it I just gritted my teeth and gutted it out to the finish - much like running the last half of a marathon - uphill.

As in this author's other books there is an interesting plot/mystery with some very crafty twists and turns and all the idiosyncrasies, secrets and alliances of a small rural town are captured here. Unfortunately this is all buried under random observations and ruminations on things such as grocery shopping and supermarkets, birds and rats, maps and geography, backyards and landscaping (or the lack thereof), tunnel building, the introduction and numerous re-introductions of the same characters and a multitude of other extraneous and random topics.

There are some authors who can switch from story-line to observations to "inside the characters' heads" musings, ( P.D. James & Minette Walters come to mind), without missing a beat. Unfortunately, that's not true for this book. It's not that the diversions are poorly written - some are even poignant - it's the sheer number of them. At first they're aggravating, then inane and finally just tiresome, continually testing the reader's stamina.

I have read all the previous books in this series and unfortunately the magic of the first, "Black Dog", has yet to be recaptured which probably means this will be my last Cooper/Fry mystery.

After reading the author's first two novels I am dismayed to find such a feeble effort with this book. Flat characters, that I hardly recognize as the same people from the earlier books, and a confused, boring plot line make this book not worth the effort.

Two years ago nineteen-year-old Emma Renshaw disappeared. Now her housemate Neil Granger is found dead. Is there a link between their deaths? DS Diane Fry and DC Ben Cooper are back in this fourth book of the series set in the Derbyshire Peak District.

I loved the first three Fry/Cooper books. This one is the weakest of the four, not to say it was not good, but the plot was a bit strange and chaotic. It seemed to jump from event to event and character to character too frequently. It was easy to get confused. The author spent almost no time in giving you any of the Fry/Cooper background so it is a big help to have read the previous books. Diane Fry and Ben Cooper have a complex and mostly strained relationship, which is what sets this series apart from other British crime novels. Their relationship has played a big factor in past books and it helps to fully understand it. I highly recommend the series as a whole, but was a little disappointed in this last entry.

Two years ago, student Emma Renshaw disappeared while on her way home from university. Now, a new discovery in remote countryside prompts the police to reinvestigate the case. But, Diane Fry, in charge of the case, finds herself with a hard task made even worse by Emmas parents, who are still expecting their daughter to be found, to come home to them, to return when shes ready. They have been pestering the police and her friends ever since her disappearance, note the time of every phone-call just in case it is Emma, keep her car ready and waiting in the garage, and retain all of her Christmas presents in her bedroom  not touched since she left  upstairs.

Eventually, Dianes search leads her to the dark, isolated village of Withens, where she runs into Ben Cooper, who has been temporarily seconded to the Rural Crime Squad, and is investigating both a series of burglaries and a vicious murder. A young man has been battered and left for dead up on the moors, left for the crows to find, and Ben finds nothing but a wall of silence. The man is a relative of the Oxleys, the oldest family in the area, descended from the very first men who buried under the moors to build the railways tunnels for 3 miles under the moors. But the Oxleys are a secretive family, protective of their own, and they refuse to talk to Ben, an outsider. Thus, progress on the investigation is almost nil. And, to compound Bens problems, Diane Frys sister, who ran off when they were teenagers, turns up out of the blue, seeking his help. She wants him to convince Diane to stop looking for, to forget her private investigations and leave things be. With the two officers relationship tense and fragile at best, this is a shift in the dynamic which could easily destroy it altogether.

Stephen Booth has, within the space of only four novels, safely joined the impressive ranks of Reginald Hill and Peter Robinson as Englands most accomplished northern crime novelists. This series, set mostly on and around the remote moors of Derbyshire, has everything. The plots are cracking and clever, paced and patterned masterfully, and the writing is very good indeed, but the most powerful feature of the series is Booths atmospheric evocation of place, which is dark and brooding and brilliant. The moors become terrifying, ominous and eerie, yet they also retain a dark beauty which draws the reader right in. And that ability to create atmosphere is displayed more strongly than ever in this fourth book, and all throughout the book he comes up with some excellent reflections of the gradual decay of the moors. The village of Withens, shrinking and dying; the forgotten churchyard, overgrown and tangled with weeds; the long-established family slowly finding themselves rent asunder.

Booth also has a great aptitude for character. His minor characters are as fascinating and well-developed as his two leads, who themselves possibly make up the most interesting duo on the scene in crime fiction. The relationship between Cooper and Fry is complex and compelling, its shifts and undercurrents have a way of making the reader slightly nervous. The tension between the two is palpable, and the obviousness of the fact that they do care about one another, on various levels, often has the reader imploring them to take a step back and just listen to one another properly just for a change. To be honest, I doubt there is another relationship with as great a dynamic and level of interest in all the crime genre. The series is worth reading just for the shifts and changes and subtle nuances in the pairs attitude toward one another.

Stephen Booth has won the Barry award for Best British novel two years running, and, with the fact that Blind to the Bones is the strongest novel yet in this powerful series, I wouldnt be at all surprised if he snatches it for a well-deserved third time.

Booth has a nice touch as he sketches the rainy, windy, and dreary landscape of Derbyshire. Ben Cooper and Diane Fry are subordinate and boss; sometimes friends and foes--and they each investigate different mysteries that do converge toward the end of the novel.

Emma Renshaw has been missing for over two years, and everyone knows that 20-something adults who disappear are usually dead. But in the case of Emma, could she still be alive and working her way back to her parents? When her cellphone is found bloodstained in a field, Diane picks up the trail gone cold as she tries to track down the missing woman.

Ben, on the other hand, is investigating the death of a young man found in a mining shaft. As he tries to learn more about the victim, the victim's family, and his whereabouts, Cooper discovers a vicious, tightknit family that probably knows the solution to the mystery but absolutely refuses to provide one datum of information to help the police. Why so obstructive, especially since the victim is related to this supposedly tightknit family?

The novel is well written, but it's significantly too long and overburdened with descriptions of well dressings, weirdo villagers who paint their faces and smack sticks on the ground, and so forth. His interest in the folkiness of Derbyshire's inhabitants derails an otherwise interesting, but not captivating mystery.

This is a book that will take you a while to finish--not because of its length--but because many segments of the novel are tedious and irrelevant to the plot. You find it's easy to put down. I know that I was relieved to finish it so I could move on to something else. Maybe I picked the wrong Booth novel in the series on which to begin, but I won't read another.

I love British writers of mysteries. This was a new author for me, and like most British writers of mysteries and crime novels, he is very much in command of the English language at its best. Unlike American mystery writers who feel they have to insert a swear word every other sentence or feel their books with bloody mayhem...British authors, this one included, tend to use the language better and focus on the plot and characters. They get the attention of the reader through their language and many of them give good insight into the psychological reasons for the murders or crimes committed.

Booth started out well in this book, and it was not a bad read. It just took him forever to get to the point. I don't mind big heavy books, in fact, I read them all the time having to do with bioethics and medicine. But writing just to prolong the book, even if the language is well-written, does nothing to keep the attention of the reader. I half suspect Booth was trying to bring attention to some problems that the British are having with dealing with the complex sociological problems of small towns disappearing and people have no where to go being pushed out by greedy landlords. We have the same problems here in the U.S. and yet in the end, the information concerning this in Blind to the Bones had very little to do with the murder. In fact, more information could have been given concerning the murderer's psyche...but it came rushing in at the end.

I think I will try this author again, with some of his other, more praised books. See if this is a regular problem in his writings, or if it was just this one novel.

Karen Sadler

This was my first Stephen Booth book and I won't be bothered trying another one. I couldn't concentrate on the story, I felt I was being lectured to in a history or geography class during the drawn out descriptions of everything and found myself rolling my eyes. Since I hadn't read the previous books I didn't know the background story between Diane Fry and Ben Cooper and couldn't be bothered reading after chapter 4 to find out what had happened. I found all the characters flat, one dimensional and boring.