Death Watch

DI Peter Shaw & DS George Valentine #2

by Jim Kelly

The cold case that shattered his father still haunts Detective Peter Shaw. Now, it’s back — claiming new victims.

5th September 1992. Fifteen-year-old Norma Jean Judd walks out of her King’s Lynn home, and vanishes. No body. No suspects. The case goes cold under the watch of DCI Jack Shaw, Peter’s late father.

Eighteen years to the day, the body of Norma Jean’s brother is discovered inside a hospital incinerator — burned almost beyond recognition. The evidence leaves no room for doubt: this was murder.

Shaw and DS Valentine are assigned to the case — and uncover a chilling link to Norma Jean’s disappearance. This was the case that broke his father — and it’s far from over.

Now, Shaw and DS Valentine must track down a ruthless killer before they strike again.

Genres: Mystery, Crime, Fiction, British Literature, Procedural, Police, Ebooks

400 pages, Paperback

First published February 4, 2010

About the author

Jim Kelly is a journalist and education correspondent for the Financial Times. He lives in Ely with the biographer Midge Gilles and their young daughter. The Water Clock, his first novel, was shortlisted for the CWA John Creasey Award for best first crime novel of 2002.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

enjoyed this my first novel in this series by this author and was a page turner and kept me interested with the unfolding plot

[Carey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic writing, superb and gripping plot, realistic police procedures and characters, and beautifully evocative of the North Norfolk coast has made this one of my favourite books this year.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Note to self - push Jim Kelly books much higher up the to read list. Every one that I have read I have enjoyed. This is a brilliant police procedural with layer under layer as the plots develop all carefully intertwined. The to leads are an interesting non pair and I look forward to reading about them again. Central to the success of this book is a great sense of place both in Kings lynn & Hunstanton. Recommended.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like the premise of this series, which pairs Detective Inspector Peter Shaw with his late father's partner, Detective Sergeant George Valentine. The unsolved case that haunted Valentine and Jack Shaw continues to have ramifications for the younger Shaw and his uneasy professional relationship with Valentine. Jim Kelly has all the talent of some of my other favorite writers in this genre (Ruth Rendell, Elizabeth George, Reginald Hill, Stephen Booth), with complex plotting and thorough character development. Looking forward to the next one (Death Toll)!

[Avid Series Reader · Rating 2 out of 5]

Death Watch by Jim Kelly is the 2nd book of the DS George Valentine & DI Peter Shaw police procedural mystery series set in late 20th-century Norfolk coast of England. George Valentine used to be a Detective Inspector in London, working with Peter Shaw's father many years ago. They were a successful team until one case in which they were accused of planting evidence. DI Jack Shaw resigned in shame;. Valentine was demoted to Sergeant and posted to the far North. He's been ordered not to keep trying to find evidence for that old case (but he does anyway, just more covertly). Peter Shaw is not quite sure if his father planted the evidence or not. That shred of doubt prevents Peter from fully trusting his partner Valentine (who senses the distrust). At times during the current case, they do not keep each other fully informed.

Hospital worker Byan Judd dies a gruesome death in the incinerator. At first it appears to be a drug deal gone bad, which would be an easy and convenient case wrap-up for hospital officials and law enforcement. But on the same day other suspicious events took place involving the Judd family, so Shaw and Valentine keep investigating. The story is a tome with many characters and plot lines, hard to remember between reading sessions.

The day of Bryan's death, the street on which the Judds lived had a complete power outage. The victim's father Andy threw a Molotov cocktail into the local pub. General vandalism, drunkenness and rioting ensued, plus adultery between the victim's wife Ally and Father Martin, who ran the local homeless shelter.

Shaw and Valentine learn that Bryan's twin sister Norma Jean disappeared on the same date many years ago. Many residents on the street believe the local recluse Jan Orzsak killed her, and Orzsak's home is vandalized on every anniversary of Norma Jean's disappearance. Bryan and Sean's oldest brother Sean left the family and has never returned.

The saga drags on with countless interviews of the street residents and hospital employees until page 200, where the main crime (and main plot line) is finally revealed - illegal organ transplants. Shaw and Valentine continue doggedly following up on each clue as it is uncovered. It's page 330 before the action begins, with a chase scene through the haar (a term for fog or sea mist in Scottish English).

Plot twists interconnect the many plot lines, as Shaw and Valentine's case grows increasingly violent and dangerous. You would never want to see the horrific crime scenes in a movie. In the end, justice prevails.

[Shannon · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very unpleasant read. This book was also that rarity: a book I disliked, but that was well-written. I have maintained that I can read (and enjoy) anything if it is well-written enough. I stand corrected. This book was a gritty, gruesome, grim look at dysfunctional families, homelessness, child murder, suicide and illegal human organ transplants, etc., etc!
For all that, as well as being overlong, sometimes I was just astounded at the perfection of the prose the author employed to convey his ugly messages! His vocabulary is excellent and his syntax is even better, but oh, what a searing, sorry tale he tells!

[Gloria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid British dark mystery with plenty of grit for those with good stomachs. This is about illegal organ harvesting and takes numerous (too many?) divergent paths to show just how such a terrible system might come about. Contrasts poverty with affluence and associates childhood trauma with adult dysfunction.

Would have liked to have seen a bit more emotional distress and/or connections among the two key police staff. Instead, they were just hyper-focused on finding the guilty party.

[Deb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shaw and valentine link an 18-year old missing person case with a present day murder. This involves people living in a housing development, members of a church, a homeless shelter, drugs, a dysfunctional family and a lot of secrets.

[Areex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent page turner. From the very beginning everything was a mystery, where was it going? 3/4 of the way in, I thought I had it figured out. But then a new twist and a new direction. A lot of pages but it goes fast.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well-written "police mystery" that eventually involves several different cases, some of which were unexpected. Shaw & Valentine are very interesting characters with different strengths and weaknesses. It's a fast-paced and intriguing book.

[Barbpie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the multiple intricate plotlines, the well-developed characters, and the beautiful setting of Death Watch.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three separate mysteries made for a convoluted, scattershot read.

[Bryngel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oh, well. I got to read about a million interviews. Frustrating and not very good.

[Mary Ann Olsztyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kinda long. Convoluted. Lots of plots and victims. I thought the ending kind of cut short on one of the plots.

[Damaskcat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Norma Jean Judd disappears in 1992 and she is never found either dead or alive. Her twin brother, Bryan, is sure she is dead because of the psychic link they have as twins. Eighteen years later, to the day, Bryan himself is found dead in gruesome circumstances. DI Peter Shaw and DS George Valentine must try and unravel the strange circumstances in which Bryan met his death and in the process try and understand what is going on in Erebus Street where he has lived all his life.

The investigation takes the ill-matched pair into some unexpected criminal networks with world wide links as well as local ones. In the background is the unsolved case which caused Shaw's father's early retirement and Valentine's reduction in rank. They have been told not to investigate but can they resist the temptation to right an old wrong?

I found this a powerful and emotional story in which some of the descriptions are quite unpleasant though they are not over done. The squeamish may want to skip some of the descriptions of bodies as they may give you nightmares. I did feel - in spite of my dislike of such descriptions - that these were necessary to the story to convey the horror of the circumstances. The book raises some uncomfortable issues which are all too modern and certainly gave me cause to think about my own views of these issues.

This book is the second in a well written and interesting series of mysteries set in and around Kings Lynn, Norfolk. The author brings this area of the country to life and you can almost smell the salt air as you read. I recommend this book and this series to anyone who enjoys well written police procedural novels with characters you feel you want to get to know.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book 2 in the Valentine and Shaw series. A very satisfying read in the mould of good British detective fiction. No raging psychopaths on the edge of society, but rather ordinary people making bad choices. The back-story in this series is particularly interesting. Instead of broken or strained family relationships, the ongoing back-story involves Shaw's attempts to prove that his father was not guilty of planting evidence in his last case, the one that lead to his early retirement and premature death. This is complicated by Valentine having been his father's partner and demoted for his part in the supposed scandal. Despite their personal differences and very different policing styles, the pair stumble towards the truth, sometimes together and sometimes not. The biggest complication of all is that Shaw is not entirely sure that his father was innocent.

[Minty McBunny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of the way through, I thought this was going to be a four-star book. My library did not have the first book in the series but I had no problem picking up the threads of the previous stories and enjoying this book on its own. I liked the characters of Shaw and Valentine and enjoyed the mystery and the vivid settings. unfortunately I felt like the conclusion was extremely muddled, there were too many moving parts and it felt very over the top yet anti-climactic at the same time. that said, I would like to read further in the series and see how it goes.

[Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes, this book is long and detailed, but if you like British mystery you know they don't often investigate just one murder or case at a time. Like life this book is more developed, winding it's way into a large cast and many lives. In the end it all wraps up, but leaves one case open -I'm thinking for book two. All in all I really liked Shaw and Valentine and would pick up another in the series.

[Jazz · Rating 3 out of 5]

After really enjoying "Death Wore White," I was eager to get onto the next book in this series. It started out interestingly enough, but really bogged down for me in the middle. Not a bad book, but getting to the solution seemed overcomplicated, and I became bored with the subplot of Shaw trying to solve an old case of his father's, which had begun in the first book. However, the characters are well-developed and I know I will read more in this series.

[Sandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jim Kelly's books go from strength to strength in character-building and complexity and his writing is to be much admired. I was put in mind of Dick Francis reading this one - he has obviously done his research into the crime that drives this plot but allows it to filter in rather than deposit it. It is an excellent and thoroughly enjoyable example of the so-called clue-led English type of detective novel.

[Heidi (on slight hiatus) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid British mystery with several plot threads and interesting characters. My only complaint is that, while very well written, it just never gains momentum. Took me more than a week to read... That's slow going for a mystery!

[Pam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second time I have read this book, and if its possible I enjoyed it even more than the first time, there's a bit of everything going on yet keeps your interest all the way through, I really good book.

[Carole · Rating 4 out of 5]

Time consuming read as quite long and involved plot but very well plotted and despite gruesome topic and dark themes a great read. Couldnt put it down and I think better than Death Wore White. Going to read the next one!

[Nicko · Rating 1 out of 5]

Horrible read. While his first book had a decent pace Jim Kelly seems to spend pages on uninteresting descriptions instead of plot. Could not even finish reading it.

[Gail · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too slow-moving for me.

[Virginia Belval · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable mystery. Second in a series.

[Marianne · Rating 1 out of 5]

Just couldn't get into this one. Didn't finish it.

[E Goldberg]

A little unbelievable. Hi-tech / urban yokel .. no way.

[Mary G. · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a well written British police proceedural. It had a great premise and the two lead detectives have an interesting back story.

[Selene]

Ex-library