Customer Reviews

The Dance Master

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"The Dance Master" by Peter Turnbull is the eighth book in his Hennessey and Yellich mystery series. For readers of the series, I can tell you it is much like all his previous installments: the plot is relatively engrossing, but his main characters remain boring and do not have any growth experiences to develop them as interesting protagonists. Hennessey and Yellich are presented the same in each book--as two nice men, one older and one young, who work hard and go home to the routine of their personal lives. The same description of their characters and life experiences is used in each Turnbull novel.

I will give Turnbull credit for coming up with imaginative plots. In this book the action starts with a bag of human bones deposited in a housing estate--it seems they are meant to be found. Hennessey and Yellich turn to the missing person files to start their identification process after learning that each of the twelve bones has different DNA. Hennessey discerns early that the serial killer (or killers?) wants to be found and stopped, and Hennessey knows that has to happen fast before the next killing. In "The Dance Master" Turnbull uses the criminal's point of view more than in any other of his previous books. Doing so adds to the urgency of the story, though why the criminal is who he is and does what he does is never really explained fully to my satisfaction.

One thing about Turnbull's dialogue that I don't get is the rather formal and archaic speech style used by the characters. It seems like unlikely people in the 21st century talk in such a way, though perhaps in Yorkshire they do.

For a quick mystery read without a lot of depth or character development this book is adequate. Again, for readers of the series the writing will be formulaic in many ways. I do like the setting for this series, medieval York, which is always inviting--one never gets tired of walking the medieval walls and the snickelways of York with Hennessey and Yellich.