Death on the Crags by Jo Allen

 

"He was falling.

Her eyes must be playing tricks. She blinked. but nothing changed except a sountrack kicking in to this nightmare, his terrified scream tearing the silence a split-second after the fall. He seemed to hang in the air forever, arms and legs flailing like a huge black bird that had suddenly lost the power of flight, and all the while that horrible, tortured scream hung on the wind".

Death on the Crags by Jo Allen is a compelling mystery/police procedural, set in the Lake District.

This is book 9 in DCI Satterthwaite series. This book reads as a standalone, but to understand the undercurrents in the police unit and dynamics of personal relationships, I suggest reading a few of the previous books. I started the series from book 4, and have read all of them onwards (except book no.8).

Blurb:

Everybody loves Thomas Davies. Don't they?

When policeman Thomas Davies falls from a crag on a visit to the Lake District in full view of his partner Mia, it looks for all the world like a terrible but unfortunate accident - until a second witness comes forward with a different story.

Alerted to the incident, DCI Jude Satterthwaite is inclined to take it seriously - not least because of Mia's reluctance to speak to the police about the incident. As Jude and his colleagues, including his on-off partner Ashleigh O'Halloran, tackle the case, they're astonished by how many people seem to have a reason to want all-round good guy Thomas out of the way.

With the arrival of one of Thomas's colleagues to assist the local force, the investigation intensifies. As the team unpick the complicated lives of those who claim to care for Thomas but have good reasons to want him dead, they find themselves digging deeper and deeper into a web of blackmail and cruelty... and investigating a second death.

A traditional British police procedural set in Cumbria.

Review:

From the first pages I thought that this book confirms yet again that Jo Allen is a master storyteller.

It's not just the intricate crime plotlines, it's also the continuation of personal stories that keep you turning the pages. With each book you get to see how the main characters' relationships develop. They almost become your family, as you get to know them. You sympathise with them, sigh at what you perceive as their short-sightedness and stubborn mistakes, but accept them for who they are. 

Jo Allen's ability to paint a picture with words, the use of descriptive language to set the background (the landscapes of Cumbria appear atmospheric, and often reflect the inner thoughts of the protagonists), the clever introduction of suspence - all keep you engaged and interested.

The case under investigation might appear as an accident to the police and ambulance who arrive at the scene of the fall on the crags, but the reader is alerted from the start of the book that it is much more sinister than that. 

One of the witnesses happens to be working alongside Jude. When the police begin looking into the victim's life and work, they come to the initial conclusion that Thomas Davies is a nice guy.

"There were bad apples, corrupt coppers, police officers whose heavy-handedness made enemies even among those who weren't criminals, but Thomas wasn't one of them. Or was he? Did he have something to hide - or know something someone else was determined should be kept quiet?"

Thomas's partner Mia behaves suspiciously, avoiding to talk to the police. She is obviously shocked to witness her partner's fall, but there is more to her reticence to communicate with the investigation unit.

Mia is one of those women who lack self-confidence, and self-destruct personal relationships. Abandoned by her mother as a young child, Mia has lived with her father, stepmother and stepbrother. She has resented her stepmother Sarah for many years, to the point of wishing her dead.

It is interesting to see a stepmother in fiction, who is not one-dimensional. We first see her through Mia's eyes, as an interfering annoying woman, but as we get to know her, Sarah is far from being the wicked stepmother. She has her faults, yet Mia has an unpleasant side to her too. 

The main plotline, crime and interpersonal, is running in parallel to the personal relationships between Jude, and Becca, and Ashley and her obsession with her ex. Jude and Ashley are friends with benefits. They trust each other, and work well as a team (as a reader, I never warmed up to Becca, and was hoping that Jude and Ashley will be together). 

"Sometimes he [Jude] thought he'd trusted her too much himself, given away too much, let her in on secrets about himself that she ended by understanding better than he did".

Death on the Crags is a gripping, intense and thought-provoking read. It makes you think about the complexity of human relationships, and frailties of love. I have great admiration for Jo Allen's work. She creates plausible flawed characters, unpredictable and multi-dimensional.

This review is part of the blog tour for Death on the Crags.

Many thanks to Jo Allen and Rachel's Random Resources for my copy of the book!

Purchase Links 

UK - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BB33T34Y 

US - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BB33T34Y 

Author Bio – 

Jo Allen was born in Wolverhampton and is a graduate of Edinburgh, Strathclyde and the Open University, with undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in geography and Earth science. She's been writing for pleasure and publication for as long as she can remember. After a career in economic consultancy she took up writing and was first published under the name Jennifer Young, in genres of short stories, romance and romantic suspense. She wrote online articles on travel and on her favourite academic subject, Earth science. In 2017 she took the plunge and began writing the genre she most likes to read -- crime.

Jo lives in the English Lakes, where the DCI Satterthwaite series is set. In common with all her favourite characters, she loves football (she's a season ticket holder with her beloved Wolverhampton Wanderers) and cats.

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