My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Meet forensics expert Dr David Hunter in the menacing, skin-prickling, tense new thriller from Simon Beckett - the number one European best-selling author.
Dr David Hunter receives a phone call one Friday evening from a Detective Inspector Lundy from the Essex police force. A badly decomposed body has been washed up near Mersea Island and the local police would welcome Hunter’s help with the recovery and identification...
They’d like it to be the body of Leo Villiers, the 31-year-old son of a prominent local family who went missing weeks ago. Villiers was supposed to be having an affair with married woman Emma Derby, who too is missing. The local force believe that the young man disposed of his lover, and then killed himself. But could it really be that simple?
As Hunter is drawn into a toxic mire of family secrets and resentments, local lies and deception, he finds himself unable or perhaps unwilling, to escape even though he knows the real thread comes from the living, not the dead.
They’d like it to be the body of Leo Villiers, the 31-year-old son of a prominent local family who went missing weeks ago. Villiers was supposed to be having an affair with married woman Emma Derby, who too is missing. The local force believe that the young man disposed of his lover, and then killed himself. But could it really be that simple?
As Hunter is drawn into a toxic mire of family secrets and resentments, local lies and deception, he finds himself unable or perhaps unwilling, to escape even though he knows the real thread comes from the living, not the dead.
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The Restless Dead is book five in the David Hunter series. I have not read any of the previous books in this series, but I have heard about it and have wanted to read them so I was happy to get the chance to participate in a blog tour for this book.
David Hunter is blacklisted after events in the previous book so when he gets a call for help to identifying a body doesn't he hesitate to go. This seems to be an open and shut case, they have a missing man and now they have found a body, but Hunter feels that something is wrong, despite the missing man's father confirmed that the dead man is wearing his son's clothes. And on his way to the mortuary for the autopsy does he take the wrong turn and suddenly he runs into problems with a flooded road and car that ends up stuck in the water and ends up taking refuge at a family that not only is acting hostile to him, but they also seem to have some secrets....
With this action, just getting stuck and having to accept help from strangers is Hunter suddenly drawn into a web of secrets. There is something odd going on, people are harbinger secrets and when the young daughter in the family that Hunter is staying with goes missing will the case suddenly take a different direction.
The Restless Dead never made me feel lost, despite not having read the previous four books. Instead, was I fascinated by Hunter and his tragic past with the death of his family and other events that have hit him hard (like a knife attack). The story in this book is intriguing and poor Hunter just doesn't seem to be able to do anything without stumbling over a dead body or being in the middle of things that go out of hand. I was engrossed with the story and I loved that it was hard to see how it all would end. Then, we have the interesting ending of the book when everything has been resolved, wow what a perfect and frustrating cliffhanger!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Simon Beckett has worked as a freelance journalist, writing for national newspapers and colour supplements. He is the author of four international bestselling crime thrillers featuring his forensic anthropologist hero, Dr David Hunter: The Chemistry of Death, Written in Bone, Whispers of the Dead and The Calling of the Grave. His other novels are Stone Bruises and Where There’s Smoke.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Simon Beckett has worked as a freelance journalist, writing for national newspapers and colour supplements. He is the author of four international bestselling crime thrillers featuring his forensic anthropologist hero, Dr David Hunter: The Chemistry of Death, Written in Bone, Whispers of the Dead and The Calling of the Grave. His other novels are Stone Bruises and Where There’s Smoke.
I've just read this, and loved it too. He's long been on my "must read" list, now he's on my "must read the rest" list!
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