Silent Fear

By: Katherine Howell

Narrated by: Caroline Lee

On a searing summer's day paramedic Holly Garland rushes to an emergency to find a man collapsed with a bullet wound in the back of his head, CPR being performed by two bystanders, and her long-estranged brother Seth watching it all unfold.

Seth claims to be the dying man's best friend, but Holly knows better than to believe anything he says and fears that his reappearance will reveal the bleak secrets of her past.

Detective Ella Marconi suspects Seth too, but she's also sure the dead man's wife is lying, and the deceased's boss seems just too helpful. But then a shocking double homicide makes Ella realise that her investigations are both getting closer to the killer and increasing the risk of an even higher body count.

Content warning: Contains some violence and/or strong language.

©2012 Katherine Howell (P)2012 Bolinda Publishing

Critic reviews

“Howell writes short, tight scenes with authentic-sounding dialogue and relentless pacing (and) deftly illustrates the way insights into the ways of life and death are a new religion to crime readers” (The Weekend Australian)

"For anyone looking for a thriller crime book to add to your collection, any or all of these books would be a must add." (Jill Smith, Australian Writers Rock)

"One of my favourite books of the year" (Tess Gerritsen, New York Times bestselling author of The Summer Guests)

"Action plotted as tight as a tourniquet" (The Sun Herald)

"A real page-turner that will certainly appeal to fans of medical-based crime thrillers" (Australian Bookseller & Publisher)

"An original and exciting series of novels" (Sunday Times)

listened straight through!

the story and characters were wonderful, but Caroline Lee could read me the phone book! :)

Great

Another fabulous book to listen to while I walk
I love the Ella Marconi and looking forward to the next one !

Good book terrible narration

What did you like best about Silent Fear? What did you like least?

Good story and plot. Well developed personalities. If you can get past the terrible narration and poor editing, the book will keep you engaged. I would like to believe that some of the stilted language is possibly due to translation. I like Nordic writers so have listened to quite a few. None where this bad. This narrator has a good voice but read it like a person just learning to read.

What didn’t you like about Caroline Lee’s performance?

Stilted, inappropriate pauses, little emotion

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

No far too graphic but I am sure it would do well

A DetectiveElla Marconi book.

Holly, a paramedic, is called to an emergency situation where a man is said to be in cardiac arrest, but Holly soon realizes he has been shot. She also realizes that volunteers who are supposedly providing CPR may in fact be putting him in even more danger of dying of a broken neck. To make matters worse, the man’s best friend turns out to be her estranged brother, whom she hasn’t seen for 12 years. Also, one of the cops who shows up because the victim was shot, is someone who knew her in her past when she was a drug addict and a prostitute. All of this is far behind her now, but this cop is intent upon blackmailing her for the past. The main protagonist is Detective Ella Marconi. Ella will need to determine who killed the victim, and who killed other related victims who seem to be connected to the first murder. She has in her squad a particularly awful cop who is into sexual harassment, and the other cops just expect her to live with it. This is a good book which in addition to having a spellbinding plot also shows how hard it still is for females in male-dominated professions, like paramedics and cops. Quite good.

Warning: Good but excessive "vigorous" swearing

With each successive book of this series, the swearing becomes worse. But the story and characters become much better. Very talented author and very good story. Characters vivid. But the swearing is so "vigorous" it's cringeworthy. Takes away so much from the book. 3 stars taken off just because of the excessive swearing. Not everyone wants to hear that, you know. We'd get that they're mad without it. Unnecessary and un-classy. There were long periods of time where Ella was involved so the swearing was much much less, and the book seemed so much better. But when it took off, it was pretty bad. But again, this writer is very talented! Loved Ella and her parents.

Also, wish there were less characters to follow and hear about. I couldn't recall who some of them were.

I love Caroline Lee but am surprised she would do the swearing.