LemonSky reviewed The old silent by Martha Grimes
Review of 'The old silent' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
This is actually 2 1/2 stars rounded up. I think I'm going to quit reading this series, at least for a while.
I had high hopes for this installment of the Jury/Plant series, due to highly positive reviews I had read. I also really wanted something that would make me forget the previous book in the series that I had read ([b:Help the Poor Struggler|19188286|Help the Poor Struggler|Martha Grimes|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386196134s/19188286.jpg|1643541]). Unfortunately, "The Old Silent" did not do that. The story revolves around the kidnapping of Billy Healey eight years earlier. The ransom was not paid and the boy was never found. The case had faded into obscurity until Nell Healey, Billy's stepmother, dramatically shoots her husband, Roger Healey, Billy's father, to death right in front of Richard Jury. Obviously, Roger Healey's death is linked to his son's disappearance, but how? Nell Healey isn't talking. Jury and Melrose Plant are back to …
This is actually 2 1/2 stars rounded up. I think I'm going to quit reading this series, at least for a while.
I had high hopes for this installment of the Jury/Plant series, due to highly positive reviews I had read. I also really wanted something that would make me forget the previous book in the series that I had read ([b:Help the Poor Struggler|19188286|Help the Poor Struggler|Martha Grimes|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386196134s/19188286.jpg|1643541]). Unfortunately, "The Old Silent" did not do that. The story revolves around the kidnapping of Billy Healey eight years earlier. The ransom was not paid and the boy was never found. The case had faded into obscurity until Nell Healey, Billy's stepmother, dramatically shoots her husband, Roger Healey, Billy's father, to death right in front of Richard Jury. Obviously, Roger Healey's death is linked to his son's disappearance, but how? Nell Healey isn't talking. Jury and Melrose Plant are back to investigating a modern-day crime that has links to one in the past, just like "Help the Poor Struggler."
I tried, but I just could not get interested in this book. Nell Healey was totally colorless and I never got a sense of her as a person. It was mostly just descriptions of her by other people. Jury annoyed me with his mooning over Ms Healey. He's such a picture of doom and gloom that I wonder anyone wants to be around him. Melrose Plant was a relief - until he started chasing after an American motorcylist who dresses in leather and writes novels (seriously?). I won't even comment on Macalvie, who comes across like as a parody of a 1940s gumshoe. I found myself speeding through the last 1/3 of the novel just so I could get it over with. I figured out what happened, which I have never done before in a Jury/Plant novel, and I really did not care. Like "Help the Poor Struggler," this one is definitely not a keeper.