The Sound of Her Voice – Nathan Blackwell
Detective Buchanan remembers every victim. But this one he can’t forget.
The body of a woman has been found on a pristine New Zealand beach – over a decade after she was murdered.
Detective Matt Buchanan of the Auckland Police is certain it carries all the hallmarks of an unsolved crime he investigated 12 years ago: when Samantha Coates walked out one day and never came home.
Re-opening the case, Buchanan begins to piece the terrible crimes together, setting into motion a chain of events that will force him to the darkest corners of society – and back into his deepest obsession…
My thanks to Tracy Fenton at Compulsive Readers for the chance to join the blog tour. I received a review copy from the publishers.
Over the last couple of years I have been invited to read some really great New Zealand based thrillers and it has opened my eyes to a wave of crime writing talent perviously not on my radar. Add the name Nathan Blackwell to that list – The Sound of Her Voice was a terrific read.
The story is led by Matt Buchanan, he is a cop in Auckland and he is called to investigate when human remains are found. The body (as is) has been in place for over 10 years and to investigate Matt will be required to revisit many incidents from the past.
As the blurb aludes to, every cop has a case which they will not let go. For Matt that is the unexplained disappearance of a young girl who simply vanished with no trace and has haunted Matt since. He keeps in touch with her family and refuses to accept he will never find the missing girl. However the discovery of the murder victim will bring that cold case back to focus and a sequence of disturbing revelations will follow.
Nathan Blackwell makes very effective use of multiple timeline narratives. We will be in present day, back to significant events in Matt’s early days of being a member of the police force and we touch into several key elements of his developing career. It allows the reader to understand what drives Matt and to watch him find his place. The action flows well and characters are likeable (if appropriate), plausible and I wanted to read more about them.
The Sound of Her Voice was another #yeahnoir treat – to find more great New Zealand crime thrillers I highly recommend searching #yeahnoir online – so many gems to discover.
The Sound of Her Voice is published by Orion and is available in digital, paperback and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sound-Her-Voice-addictive-thriller-ebook/dp/B07JX57RBG/ref=sr_1_1?qid=1575196261&refinements=p_27%3ANathan+Blackwell&s=digital-text&sr=1-1&text=Nathan+Blackwell
