Loving this series!

The Heron's Cry (Two Rivers #2) by Ann Cleeves         

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Once more trouble comes to the Two Rivers area (where the Taw meets the Torridge) in North Devon.

Detective Inspector Matthew Venn continues to be revealed both on the personal and work level.

A bizarre murder has occurred at an artists’ commune. The surprising thing is that Venn’s colleague Jen Rafferty had met the victim, Nigel Yeo, the previous evening at a party. He had wanted to talk to her about some matter. 

The property consisted of a house with seperate faults and workshops. The tenants had come together under the patronage of a rather strange benefactor Francis Ley, a well known but somewhat reclusive, eccentric economist.

When another murder occurs Matthew has a strange road to travel in order to unravel what’s happening, along with his team, Jen and the reluctant Ross.

It turns out the victim ‘Nigel [had]worked for North Devon Patients Together, NDPT. It represents patients’ views to the [health] trusts… [Nigel had] widened the brief to look into anomalies, and to explore patients’ complaints.’ Nigel had been looking into a complaint about a suicide. 

A starting point for Venn!

Matthew’s husband Jonathan ‘managed the Woodyard, a large and successful community arts centre.’ So further connections are drawn. On the home front we see more of Matthew and Jonathan’s relationship, circling not only Matthew’s compartmentalisation of work and home, but also his troubled rapport with his mother.

I loved the juxtaposition between Jonathan’s analogy about Matthew’s focus on the elements of cases, and Matthew’s view of himself. From just this short scene we learn so much more.

Matthew: ‘There was the silhouette of a heron, tall and stately, dark grey against the paler grey of the water. It stood quite alone.’

Jonathan: ‘Those birds always remind me of you. So patient. Just willing to wait. Entirely focused on their prey…Silent. [and then] I never know what you’re thinking.’

Put these reflections together with the title, The Heron’s Cry, and there’s so much more one could unpack here.

Another complex and saturated mystery from Cleeves.

A St. Martins Press ARC via NetGalley 

Please note: Quotes taken from an advanced reading copy maybe subject to change