Telling Tales (Vera Stanhope, 2)

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Emma's parent's home seems cold and empty which was a perfect metaphor for what was going on with a lot of people. She seems to have three voices, crotchety old man/woman - they sound closely alike, implausibly naive young woman and young hooligan. Despite looking on DS Joe Ashworth as an honorary son, she is not blind to his sentimentality and how easily he is fed a sob story. I found very few of the characters likeable, and even appreciated how one unreliable narrator was modeled after Emma Bovary (of Madame Bovary notoriety).

In the autumn of 2006, Ann and Tim finally achieved their ambition of moving back to the North East. Telling Tales revisits a 10-year old murder after the woman convicted of the crime kills herself in prison and after a new witness comes up clearing her of the murder.In 1987 Tim, Ann and their two daughters moved to Northumberland and the north east provides the inspiration for many of her subsequent titles. The MacMillan audio edition of Telling Tales, read by Julia Franklin, was shortlisted for an 'Audie' Award for best Mystery. There was less fussing around with setting the stage, and Vera herself entered the scene much earlier in the story. Given that the second murder is investigated under the authority of the the Yorkshire force and Vera has a tendency to rub people up the wrong way, DS Joe Ashworth comes in handy as a foil to extract information in their tremendous double act. But the story is also told from other perspectives, those of the town folk proper and this adds a nice touch.

And there were elements that were different in the book than in the show [which helped with my confusion and I was totally okay with that] and when I finally *thought* I DID remember, I was close but ultimately wrong.I wasn't sure how I'd feel about reading this one since I've watched the episode on TV (twice) but it was fascinating to see the differences.

The detectives soon found the culprit, and Jeanie Long was sent to prison for the dastardly deed, who by all accounts was having a passionate affair with the father of the victim. She was attracted less by the ornithology than the bottle of malt whisky she saw in his rucksack when she showed him his room.This meant the huge array of supporting characters started to blend together slight and it was easy to get some of the characters muddled. There are secrets in the village of Elvet that Vera and Joe continually must dig into and even then, almost get onto the wrong path of the killer.