Silent Waters

By L V Matthews @LV_matthews

Narrated by Rebecca Norfolk @RebeccaNorfolk

Published by W.F. Howes Ltd (audio) https://www.wfhowes.co.uk/ @WFHowes Welbeck Publishing Group (print) https://www.welbeckpublishing.com/ @welbeckpublish

384 pages (8 hours 38 minutes) 9781004123230

Publication date 14 September 2023

I was allowed access to an audio review copy on Net Galley https://www.netgalley.com/ @NetGalley.  Thanks to the Author and Publisher for organising this.

The cover

Perhaps missing a little of the wow factor but it fits in with the content and also stylistically follows the covers of her previous novels.

From the blurb

Is blood thicker than water?

At 5am one summer’s morning, police diver Jen Harper wakes to find herself submerged in the silt of a river with no memory of how she got there.

Forty-eight hours later, she’s called to dive in the same river in search of a missing woman, Claudia Franklin.

But for Jen, this is no ordinary job. Her and Claudia’s families were entangled for decades – there is unresolved resentment between them, unspoken secrets.

Jen hasn’t seen Claudia for twelve years now. Or has she?

The narration

I loved the narration. There were a few instances in the production where there was a scene change but an insufficient gap was included to distinguish this. That said it did not detract from an enjoyable audiobook experience.

My thoughts

A slightly odd but highly significant start as we come across Jen in the water. Rivers, pools and the water meadows become a recurring theme throughout the novel as activity or thoughts return there time after time. As the story gradually unfolds, we slowly become to appreciate the significance. That Jen is a sleepwalker is quickly established, as she finds herself in the water without any recollection of getting there. Being not uncommon amongst children, adult sleepwalking is much rarer and potentially more dangerous and significant. In adults it is brought on usually by stress or trauma, so the reader is on guard for a troubled past and blurring of reality and dreams for Jen.

Jen is a diver with the police, a demanding job but one that she loves. A single mum, son Sam is the apple of her eye. A tightknit circle of family (brother Bill) and friends (bestie Kerry) help her balance these two demands and have a fulfilling life after her dreams were snatched from her. Jen was a competitive diver, a good one, whose Olympic dreams were snatched away by illness. Her place was taken by her friend Claudia.

Claudia was the ‘uptown girl’ who went to the posh girls’ school, bright and attractive, she turned the heads of all the boys, and they all knew her name. Bill had a crush on her and one day summons the courage to invite her swimming with his friends down at the river meadows, an action that will entwine their futures together. It is Claudia’s return after many years away that cause the past to unravel.

This is a novel of many intense emotions, weaknesses, secrets and lies, but above all exploitation. There is ambition in the desire for Olympic success and all the trappings of wealth and fame that come with it, but this leads to jealousy and hate. There is desire and lust, with Bill’s crush on Claudia being the starting point, Jen’s moment of madness and an older man with great charm, who is a master of coercive control and exploiting positions of power. This character captures the zeitgeist of the 2020s perfectly as more women now are finding the strength to speak out.

The narrative of the present is peppered with memories of the past, evoked by Claudia’s disappearance. Every time the narrative seems to be heading off in a new direction, like the effects of gravity something causes it to arc back towards the black hole at the centre of the story. This epicentre is the old barn, where something happened to tie the friends together forever. Only when the secret is revealed we can see the differing perspectives of the characters.

Jen is an excellent character, the kind of modern woman we are seeing regularly in crime fiction now, strong, determined and successful on her own terms. We see she has forged a new career in a tough job that she loves and one in which she is respected by her colleagues. She manages to pull off that trick of being ‘one of the boys’ without dropping to their level, she is no uncouth ‘ladette’. It is a measure of love for her brother that she is willing to risk her career to protect him. He is a troubled man who has turned from an obsession about Claudia to an addiction that his blighting his life. He is not one of life’s sad losers, more a man who has played the cards he was deal badly and is compounding this by making bad decisions which impact on others. Once in a downward spiral it is almost impossible to recover without help, but his pride is preventing this. Claudia is the most complex character and I’m sure like me your opinion of her will vacillate as the story progresses.

The writing is a delight, and the pacing is expertly judged, moving along briskly but still finding time for a rich description life at the diving pool and Jen’s life at work. There is danger at times, but this is a novel that works by holding its suspense and not giving its secrets away too cheaply. So expect deceit and surprises as the story twists and turns. This keeps the reader/listener on edge and alert, it’s not a novel you can tune out to. The scenes where Jen is diving as part of her work are perhaps the most gripping and suspenseful, as she gropes around in the semi-dark which is life a metaphor for her sleepwalking exploits.

Silent Waters is a wonderfully suspenseful story of family ties and grave mistakes.

Silent Waters can be purchased via the Bookshop.org here

The author

For over ten years L V Matthews worked both in domestic and international sales for major UK publishing houses, before leaving to pursue a career in writing.
SILENT WATERS is her newest book (2023)
THE TWINS (Feb 2022) is a Richard and Judy Bookclub pick.
Also available, THE PRANK. All from Welbeck Publishing.

She is represented by Camilla Bolton from The Darley Anderson Agency.

Source: Goodreads profile