The Killing Stones (Jimmy Perez) by Ann Cleeves

The Killing Stones (Jimmy Perez) by Ann Cleeves
Buy The Killing Stones (Jimmy Perez) by Ann Cleeves at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com (Paid links)
Category: Crime
Reviewer: Sue Magee
Summary: #
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 384	Date: October 2025
Publisher: Macmillan
External links: Author's website
ISBN: 978-1035043095
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I can't have been the only person who was sad when Inspector Jimmy Perez left Shetland to start a new life on Orkney. It's been seven years since we heard from him, but he's now living with Willow Reeves and their young son, James, as well as Cassie, the daughter of his former partner. Willow's also his boss, and she should be on maternity leave, but when the body of a popular islander, Archie Stout, is found, in the aftermath of a storm, she can't resist getting involved. He'd been battered about the head with a Neolithic stone - one of a pair - which had been stolen from a museum.

There's a further complication: Archie and Jimmy were close friends and distant relatives. Jimmy knows that Archie wasn't perfect - his womanising was legendary - but he's grieving whilst trying to investigate. Perhaps it should be otherwise, but the team from Glasgow seem reluctant to try to get to Orkney and possibly be stranded there over Christmas. It's down to Perez and Reeves - and one of the main problems will be sorting fact from local myth and legend.

It was fascinating to see how the change of location would affect the Shetland series, if it can really be called a part of that series. I can see why a change was necessary - the number of murders on Shetland was likely to have a serious effect on the size of the population! Perez is now more confident in himself and seemingly unworried about the fact that his partner keeps intruding into his investigation. He's settled and content (if not always with what is required of a policeman in a place as insular as Orkney), but he hasn't quite achieved happiness. Perhaps he never will.

What hasn't changed is Ann Cleeves' skill in crafting a plot. She is superb. I was convinced that various people were the perpetrators (it didn't usually bode well for them in the long run), only to find that I'd never really looked in the right direction. Classic Cleeves.

There is an obvious link between this book and the Shetland series, but this book is being referred to by the publishers as Jimmy Perez and Willow Reeves, Book 1 so I think it's legitimate to hope for more to come. I do hope so.

As well as reading the galley made available to me by the publishers, I also listened to an audio download, which I bought myself. It was narrated by Kenny Blyth. He has a good range of voices. I wasn't entirely convinced by what I think was intended as a Yorkshire accent, but that's me being very picky. The Orcadian voices were good, and I was never in any doubt about whose voice I was hearing.

Ann Cleeves' Shetland Novels in Chronological Order

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