Having never read any of the previous books in this series I have now put them on my to read list. I enjoyed reading this book, I found it had the right amount of twists that kept me hooked and turning the pages. A good read.

It was a interesting enough read but not a clear stand out in this genre. The ending was great but some parts got quite boring.

Perfect Silence is the fourth book in the DI Callanach series, and full disclaimer; I haven’t read the other three. Luc Callanach is the hero of the title, a French former Interpol officer now working as a detective inspector on the Major Incident Team (MIT) in Edinburgh, Scotland. There are quite a few references to events happening to Luc, his boss Ava and other members of the MIT, but I didn’t find it was necessary to have read previous books to understand what was going on here. This stands very well standalone.

Now, I read this book without knowing the series name, and went to look it up so I could say where it fit in the series, and I have to say I’m completely confused, because Luc Callanach was at best a secondary character. The primary protagonist was Ava Turner, the DCI, and I fully expected this to be the DCI Ava Turner series. If you’re a big fan of Luc Callanach and you read this series because of how much you love Luc, I think you’re likely to be pretty disappointed here.

With that bemusing fact out of the way, I really enjoyed this book. It’s horrifying and macabre, with a serial killer kidnapping young women and cutting ‘dolls’ from their flesh, and a secondary case involving thrill-seeker attacks on homeless people. It’s a juicy read at a little over 430 pages and full of accurate (so far as I can tell) police procedural and investigative work, complete with the delays, red tape and bureaucracy that goes along with that. If you enjoy a good crime thriller or good British police drama in the vein of the TV series Line of Duty, you’ll really enjoy this.

However, for the weird fact that the series protagonist isn’t actually the main character in this book, and in fact the whole arc and character growth is about Ava, I’m going to knock it down to four stars.

I hadn't realised this was part of a series when I requested it and though there were things I'd obviously missed in the first three books, it didn't impact at all on my enjoyment of the fourth in the Scottish police series. In fact, it made me keen to read the previous installations... even though I guess I know some of what must eventuate; but I loved the characters and am confident enough in Fields' ability to spin a good yarn that I'm keen to spend more time with her creations.

Fields achieves that great balance between policing and a focus on the crime/s at hand AND on the personal lives and backstories of our characters. She also manages to unfurl two plots at once without them merging in some inexplicable way or it 'doing my head in' because one is underdone.

I really liked our two leads: DCI Ava Turner and (her underling) Luc and gather some of the other key players... fellow coppers as well as a skirting-the-law computer hacker, a journalist and a reverend have featured previously along with Ava's best friend Natasha.

It reminded me of JD Robb's In Death series and Martha Grimes Richard Jury / Melrose Plant books, which have strong ensembles and aren't overly reliant on one or two characters.

Fabulous characters aside, the plot(s) themselves are interesting though the main storyline (and crimes) are somewhat macabre. I should mention I also found it very sad, as Fields puts us in the victims' heads and even the short time we spend with them is enough to realise young lives -and their hopes and dreams - are being snuffed out. (And that's just not fair...)

The secondary plot is centred around a 'new' synthetic drug I'd not heard of.... Spice. I googled it in case it was just fictional and akin to the 'ice' epidemic oft-discussed here in Australia but apparently Spice (the zombie drug) is an alternative to cannabis but resulting in effects more like LSD.

The investigating team has a sense it could be a vigilante and (in retrospect) I guess there's a similarity between the two sets of crimes - both a combo of punishment and sick pleasure... though which is which?!

I obviously very much enjoyed this book and - when my TBR pile diminishes, or I take a break on the reviewing front - I'd like to read some previous books in the series.

Thankyou to NetGalley, Harper-collins Publishing Australia, Avon Books and Helen Fields for the opportunity to read an advanced readers copy of Perfect Silence.
I thought the book was really good. I have read previous novels penned by this author and have always found them to be a great read. This book was no exception. The storyline was well thought out and the central characters were engaging.
If you enjoy psychological thrillers, you will like Perfect Silence.