This is a police procedural with Matthew Venn as the detective who learns many unexpected things about the victim and about himself as well.

I wrote a review on Goodreads under my name Jeannie Huie.

This book was soooooo good! The author has given her readers a new locale, a new police team, and interesting non-police characters. DI Matthew Venn is a recent transfer to the area. He grew up there but was cut off from family and friends when he left their church and subsequently had to move away when he was a teenager. He has returned because of his new husband Jon's career and ties to the community. His team, Jenn and Ross, also have interesting back stories which are only hinted at. I really look forward to learning more about all of them.
The investigation of the crime revealed so many possibilities that I had to wonder if any or most were red herrings.
Needless to say, the solution was convoluted and satisfactory in every way. This is going to be a fabulous series!

The story opens with DI Matthew Venn standing outside the crematorium where he can hear the service being held for his father, whom he has not seen in many years. Venn is called to a Devon beach when a man's murdered body is found. Maurice Braddick, an elderly man, anxiously awaits the return of his adult daughter, who spends here days with other Down's Syndrome folks at a day center. How are these events connected? Cleeves weaves together a believable plot in a vivid setting. The setting is so wonderfully described that I did a little on-line investigation to see if the cities actually existing. They do. With "The Long Call" Cleeves explores the issues of gay marriage, the treatment of the disabled, religion, and how money can be used to hide unpleasantness.

I have been a fan of the Shetland series by Cleeves but found "Wild Fire" the last of the Shetland books to be disappointing. But, with "The Long Call" Cleeves has now moved on to create compelling new characters in a fascinating place.

This is the introduction to a new series by Ann Cleeves. The story is of a murder on the beach of an apparently homeless man. The story was written in a surreal way which I enjoy. The book started out with the main detective outside his father's funeral. The murder is close to home. Things are slowly revealed to the reader.
the writing was good. there were some formatting issues with the galley I received from Net Galley. which I am sure will be corrected in the finished product. I like this book a lot and it has me putting some of the authors other books in my large TBR file.

Matthew Venn is the police chief in a small village in Devon, England. When a body is found on the beach, Matthew and his team begin a search for the murderer. At first, the victim appears to be a homeless man who recently arrived in the village in need of help. But as the police investigation proceeds, the victim’s life was more complicated than everyone assumed. In fact, the investigation begins to lead closer to people in Matthew’s own life.

Author Ann Cleeves weaves a complicated tale of secrets, deceit, and murder in this novel. This is a well crafted mystery in which the exhaustion and frustrations experienced by the investigators are palpable. The characters are likable and you’ll find yourself invested in the story and hoping that the mystery will be solved.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and author Ann Cleeves for giving me the opportunity to read the ARC of this novel - the first book in a new series!

Ann Cleeves once again delivers an exquisite novel and an exquisite mystery, rich with atmosphere and peopled by nuanced and compelling characters. A compelling, twisty, and satisfying read.

Interesting read, a good mystery, British setting and terminology. Weird formatting - the beginning of each chapter, every other letter was capitalized in the first sentence and breaks within the chapters wrong.. Good world-building and interesting cast of characters with distinct motivations. I would recommend this book.

We meet Matthew a protagonist at the funeral of his father, observing, and feeling angry, a disappointment to his father. Leaving, he received a call of a man at the shores dead, with clothing that was dried. Appearance of a homeless man, that turns out was deceiving as the mystery unfolds. Turmoil as he has to return to his birth place, and hasn’t been there since a teen to interview people. Beginning of a new series by the author, and a good well flowing plot. Given ARC for my voluntary review and my honest opinion by Net Galley and San Martin Press.

An interesting mystery with several overlapping and intertwined stories. I enjoyed the main detectives and side characters and found the story engaging and well paced.

Ann Cleeves does it again a new series so well written so involving.Like her series on tv Vera this drew me in kept me involved with the characters and looking forward to the next book in the series, #netgalley #st.martinsbooks

Ann Cleeves introduces a new series,a police procedural set on the coast of Devon with a multilayered protagonist, Matthew Venn. As the book opens, Venn is standing apart and to the back, watching his father's funeral,when he is notified of the discovery of a man's body on the beach. Unraveling themystery of the death what appears to be a homeless man becomes more complicated and affects the entire community. Highly recommended!

In this introduction to a new series, Ann Cleeves gives us a complex mystery and well-developed characters. Matthew Venn is a police officer investigating the murder of a man found on the beach near his home. The investigation takes him back to his home town and causes him to interact with people with whom he broke off contact in his late teens. All of the other police officers have complicated backgrounds that are slowly revealed as the story moves forward. I thought the scenes with the special needs students from the school were particularly well done. I'll look forward to reading more in this series and to seeing how these characters develop further.

I received a free copy of this title from NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

I was so excited to see this available to request on NetGalley. I really love the Vera series and was really looking forward to a new series and The Long Call with Detective Matthew Venn does not disappoint. Detective Venn has moved back to Devon as he has recently married Jonathon, but the area holds many memories for him as he grew up there within a strict religious order. He has been estranged from his family since renouncing his faith and his same sex marriage means he won’t be welcomed back anytime soon. Detective Venn’s team includes Jen, a sharp minded single mum of teens detective, and Ross, pretty much a Dude-bro type character who grows on you as he appears more vulnerable as the book progresses.

The case starts with a body on a beach. The more that is uncovered about the man, the more questions that are raised. As Detective Venn and his team work on the murder, the case gets complicated as further crimes are committed. Themes of religious extremism, guilt, redemption, abuse, and love, especially parental, are all woven into the plot. Well paced mystery, great writing, with a whole new cast of engaging characters. I can’t wait to read the next one in this new series!

Plenty of twists and turns to keep you turning pages. However, the story just sort of ended abruptly which was a little disappointing.

This was my first Ann Cleeves book; I was familiar with the TV series based on her books and was pleased to have the opportunity to read an advance copy of the beginning of a new series. I found The Long Call to be well-written and a very good mystery. I enjoyed the locale, and I thought Cleeves did a wonderful job bringing the characters to life. It was very suspenseful and the main story lines were nicely resolved. I look forward to reading more in this series and highly recommend this book.

“The Long Call,” Ann Cleeves’s newest mystery, and the start of another series, is an inoffensive detective story that’s long on characters and short on grisly details. She has peopled her book with nice folks, hardly an ugly word from any of them, even the evildoers. That’s refreshing and she makes it easy to digest.

North Devon, a place where two rivers converge and head for the sea, is home base for Detective Matthew Venn. It’s a strictly evangelical location from which Vann has alienated himself, but dark secrets lurk inside its many charitable institutions. Hidden perversions, rape, kidnapping, and murder unveil themselves and Vann has to face people he has previously respected and never held any ill will towards.

Vann is not a super hero. He uses his brain instead of brawn and his marriage to his husband, Jonathon, while interesting, is not used as a prop to add spice to the story. He does, however, surround himself with a team of police officers who are clever and dedicated and for, the most part, very efficient. One assistant, Ross, has good qualities, but also manages to be irritating, a clever sidebar that the author inserts without too much distraction.

Cleeves uses remarkably plain language in uncovering her story. There is very little violence or smutty verbalization in her writing. Indeed, her style is flowing, almost nonchalant, without shocking violence added to promote prurient interest. The characters, even in their evil moments, seen almost virtuous and absent any malicious leanings.

If this all seems a little milk toastish to you, think again. Cleeves has a way of engaging her readers in her quiet writing that proves to be enticing. The plot line is well conceived and the action, although quiet, is entrancing. I enjoyed this book and the opportunity to study some remarkable writing. I recommend it for a thriller that doesn’t use bloody carnage as an attraction.

I had never read a book by Ann Cleeves before this one, but apparently, my life had a hole in it that I didn't know needed filling. I'm a sucker for detective stories, especially ones that bring up the past that characters thought they left behind. The writing and story told are woven well together, making for an interesting detective read that you'll want to cozy up by yourself and shut yourself off from the world until you reach the end.

The Long Call is the first book in what will be a new series by Ann Cleeves. I jumped at the chance to read it as I'm a huge fan of both Vera and Shetland. Both have been serialised on the BBC so it is now hard to think of either character or book without picturing the lead.
Now we have Matthew Venn, lead detective on a murder case in North Devon, two rivers. Matthew is new to the precinct, gay and recovering from growing up in a cult-like religious community. All of which makes for great background and setting for The Long Call. Somewhere in the book, either the back or the front the Long Call is described as the sound of the gulls that often sounds like a cry of pain. That captured me right from the start.
As in her other books, everybody knows everybody and Matthew knows a lot of the characters as his mother and the religious community aren't too far from where he lives with his husband, Jonathon. So when a stranger is found murdered on the beach where the two rivers meet, Matthew and his team hear many different stories of who this person was and what he was like as they attempt to pin down his travels in the days before he was murdered. There is the Centre which Jonathon administrates and is home to a day care for mentally challenged people, especially Downs Syndrome. There is the apartment where the murdered man lived along with two women both connected to the Centre. And there are Jen and Ross, the two other mainstays on Matthew's team who are complete opposites.
All of this makes for page turning reading as Matthew wonders whether he should, in fact, be running the case as more and more people he knows and loves become involved. Welcome back Ann Cleeves, we missed you.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this ARC possible to read.

This was a murder mystery and it did keep me guessing up to the very end. In that respect it was a well thought out plot. I was not however able to really care much about any of the characters, their backgrounds or their motivations. They all seemed to have dropped in out of nowhere and had very little to tie them to each other.
I can only presume that having a married gay center character and two of the bad guys as supposedly religious men that the author was trying to make a statement, but it fell flat with me.

Having read and loved two other series by this author (Shetland Island and Vera Stanhope), I was excited to hear that a new series was in the works and even more so when I was given a chance to read an advanced reader's copy of the first book in the series. This introduction to the Two Rivers series drew me in immediately with its lush writing, as is the case any time I've picked up one of the Shetland or Vera books. The author's ability to create realistic settings and three dimensional characters, as well as complex mysteries that often blend past and present, is one of the reasons I love her work, and this novel did not disappoint.

I connected with Detective Matthew Venn from the opening pages. He is complex, thoughtful, and compassionate. I felt like I knew and understood him, and that he was the type of character I would enjoy spending time with in the future. I was also intrigued by Venn's co-workers (particularly Jen Rafferty) and his husband, Jonathan. I am eager to learn more about their backstories and look forward to getting to know them even better as the series progresses. The secondary characters were thoughtfully portrayed and felt as fully developed as the main characters.

While I have never visited a town like North Devon, I felt like I had been transported there and was fully immersed in that world. The sense of place was strong and provided another layer to the story. If you enjoyed the Shetland Island series for its strong sense of place, I think you'll be equally drawn to the world of Two Rivers.

The mystery begins when Venn is assigned to investigate an apparent homicide. He soon discovers that the dead man found on a local beach has a connection to the community center where his husband works. The investigation grows more complicated when two women with Down's Syndrome--one of whom has a connection to the dead man--are abducted from the center. More than once, Venn offers to step back from the investigation as the ties to the center grow. However, it is clear that he will follow the investigation wherever it needs to go to uncover the truth. His past also factors into the mystery, as does his tense relationship with his family. I loved the complexity of the story and how the investigation unfolded.

I look forward to returning to North Devon soon, and am thrilled to have a new series by Ann Cleeves to add to my "must read" list. This review is based on an advanced reader edition that I received courtesy of NetGalley and Minotaur Books (thank you!).