Item: The Long Call
Rating: 5.00
Author: bookanonjeff

by Ann Cleeves

The Long Call is the captivating first novel in the Two Rivers series from Sunday Times bestseller and creator of Vera and Shetland, Ann Cleeves.

In North Devon, where the rivers Taw and Torridge converge and run into the sea, Detective Matthew Venn stands outside the church as his father's funeral takes place. The day Matthew turned his back on the strict evangelical community in which he grew up, he lost his family too.

Now he's back, not just to mourn his father at a distance, but to take charge of his first major case in the Two Rivers region; a complex place not quite as idyllic as tourists suppose.

A body has been found on the beach near to Matthew's new home: a man with the tattoo of an albatross on his neck, stabbed to death.

Finding the killer is Venn's only focus, and his team's investigation will take him straight back into the community he left behind, and the deadly secrets that lurk there.

Solid British Police Procedural. This was an excellent book for fans of any combination of mystery, British fiction, or police procedurals. And generally, I'm a fan of all three. But for some reason this book was a bit slower of a read than most books of its size, and I'm struggling to figure out why. MAYBE because it used *several* more British terms that I'm less familiar with, despite reading more and more British fiction these days? (Full disclosure: I'm an American who has lived nearly all of my days in its southeastern corner.) Regardless, truly a solid book and very much recommended, despite my personal difficulties with reading it.

The Long Call (Two Rivers, #1)

by Ann Cleeves

Reviewed by Jeff Sexton on Sep 5, 2019

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