The Healers

An Inspector Ramsay Novel

By: Ann Cleeves

Narrated by: Simon Mattacks

Before Shetland and Vera, Ann Cleeves wrote the Inspector Ramsay series featuring a talented, brilliant detective—now available for the first time in the US.

News of the murder came to Inspector Stephen Ramsay early on Monday morning: isolated farmer Ernie Bowles was found lying on his kitchen floor, gruesomely strangled.

Ramsey fears this case will not be simple. In his experience, most murders are straightforward: an explosion of family pressure, the loss of control in a fight. But Bowles seems to have kept himself to himself and had lived alone since his mother’s death. A seemingly unconnected women is then found strangled too—surely two such killings in the same locality are more than just chilling coincidence?

When Ramsay hears of a third suspicious death, a very tenuous link between the victims takes on a new importance, for all were connected in some way to the Alternative Therapy Center in Mittingford. Could one of the healers be a killer?

A Macmillan Audio production from Minotaur Books.

I finally have a handle on Ann Cleeves

She doesn't think much of marriage and relationships, she hates Christianity and calls everyone Pet. She must be a treat.

Clever and interesting

I enjoyed learning about the new age communities and the “travelers” in England. The connection between the main detectives is shifting, which is interesting, too. The narrator is excellent and the characters are all Cleevesian- with their (self) doubts, their prejudices and prides. I really like Ramsey - almost as much as Vera!

Not her best

I chose this title because I’ve enjoyed the Shetland and Vera series by this author. Sadly, this series is not at the same level. I wanted to enjoy it but was disappointed.