From the Ashes
Damien Boyd
Published June 4th, 2024
Brilliance Audio
🔥🔥🔥🔥
From the Ashes is book fourteen in the consistently brilliant DCI Nick Dixon series, set in Somerset, England. I got this from Kindle Unlimited and listened to the audiobook, ably narrated by Simon Mattacks. This was another well crafted police procedural, which has Nick and his team investigating the murders of defenceless elderly people in their homes.
A retired schoolteacher is found dead in her armchair, seemingly from natural causes, until clever probationary officer Sarah mentions the region wide warning to be on the lookout for such cases, and Dixon is called in. Discovering that the woman had been strangled, they soon discover a third case, but what connects the victims, and how do the deaths relate to a suspicious fire in a hotel years earlier?
I have read all of this series in order, although each works as a standalone mystery. My only criticism would be the complete implausibility of one detective and his team from a small city encountering quite so many multiple murderers and facing death on such a regular basis, but that’s the same with most successful detective series.
These are superbly plotted crime thrillers with just enough suspects, clues and red herrings to keep me satisfactorily in the dark until the reveal without cheating! I like the characters, especially the relationship between Nick and his fiancée, the now very pregnant DS Jane Winter, as they try to organise their wedding as well as navigating their work relationship. Happily the next one is already out and I’ll probably continue with the audiobook version as it was very well done.
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