WHAT THE DEAD WANT by M J Lee

 5* Excellent British thriller, believable and threatening.


Though this is book 10 in a series, I had no trouble getting into the tale. There's enough about the detective's past to clue new readers in and to make the ending believable. 

The tale reads like a completely believable police procedural with solid policing and detecting, with real life intruding, not unrealistically. I liked that all the potential arcs and characters all made similar low-key appearances so that the ending was a proper WTF?? moment that I hadn't a clue about. There were bad guys and shades of grey, and there was a character who's learned a painful lesson, but that lesson coupled with their rescue and the aftermath, will hopefully bring rapprochement and healing to a relationship that's suffered through emotional pain and loss. The bad guys are and do the sort of stuff that locals know occurs/exist, and how do you eradicate them when they've got a stronghold? Not sure you do, not entirely, but yeah, the detecting was solid. 

What made this book enjoyable was the lack of sensationalism and the solidity of the characters and the fact that it's a British case with all the 'let's get it done' without needing fanfare or gloss. It felt believable and relatable. 

ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Canelo, for my reading pleasure. 

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