The Ring of Death

By: Sally Spencer

Narrated by: Penelope Freeman

DCI Monkia Paniatowski has seen dozens of murder victims in her time, but nothing could have prepared her for the corpse in the woods. It is not so much that the man’s throat has been slashed that shocks her, nor even the way he is naked – it is the way he has been carefully posed.

Paniatowski has been assigned a new sergeant, who she does not entirely trust. Worse yet, an old enemy from the secret service announces he will be monitoring her every move. But why is a spy interested in a local murder?

When a second victim is found it becomes clear to Monika that whatever the murderer’s message is, he will not stop killing until she understands.

©2010 Alan Rustage (P)2010 Soundings

Missable

The plot has enough sub-plots to keep things interesting…until it gets to the animal cruelty in the last portion. If I had known this was the book’s big reveal, I never would have read it.

In addition, there is a subtle misogyny here. It’s not glaring or intrusive, but its subtlety is what makes it even more damaging because it’s under the radar. A couple of the male characters talk to the women in a condescending and demeaning way; and, the main character, Monica, asks her sergeant for his opinion on how she behaves in a certain situation. As if a man’s perspective is more valuable.

When I think about it, I think this book would have been more interesting if one of the people under Monica‘s command had been a woman, especially if she had been a woman, hiding her Oxford, high end education and not a man.

While I’m into minutiae of the book, the linguistic pedant in me does not respond well to the misuse of the word appraise for the word apprise. We appraise a piece of jewelry we apprise someone of a piece of information. The first time I heard it incorrectly used in this book I was going to let it pass, but the second time was simply too tempting to resist.

I won’t continue reading this series, because they weren’t that compelling or relatable.

great twists

not a big fan of the reader's voice, vut that's my own opinion. The story was terrific.