Thank you Netgalley for this ARC of The Silent House by Nell Pattison.

CW: violence towards children

This is a fairly run-of-the-mill murder mystery/thriller, with an added interest, the family is deaf, which means that no one hears a thing. Because the deaf community is small, the woman called upon to be the interpreter happens to know the victimized family, and day by day finds herself getting dangerously tangled in the case. Was the murderer a random stranger, or someone much closer.

I always appreciate when an author draws from their unique experience, in this case, a person from the deaf community. It helps to really learn about the culture and unique struggles on that life. Is this a totally standout thriller? Not particularly, but getting a glimpse into the world of a deaf person was well worth it.

The premise of this book is great. I had high hopes going into it but it ended up leaving me feeling so-so about it. I kept finding myself getting distracted while reading and that’s a tell-tale sign that it’s gotten dull. I may check out other books by this author because the storyline was definitely unique and that’s not easy to find these days.

The premise of this book is absolutely brilliant. The execution, however, is not great, and I'm so disappointed because it had so much potential.

Laura's youngest child has been brutally murdered. There's no sign of a break-in, and even if there was, the family are profoundly deaf so the attacker couldn't be heard. Who had motive to kill a child? Why would anyone do this?

Honestly, if you're looking for thrills, this is not it, I actually contemplated dnf'ing, but I got to 80% just hoping there was going to be a dramatic twist, reader there was not. The characters fell flat, the ending is abrupt and underwhelming. It's such a shame because I felt like it could have been so much better. I didn't care really at all. We can't love all the books sadly, and this is one of those books for me.

I enjoyed reading this so much.. wow! What a read. It has plenty of twists and turns throughout to keep you on your seat. It’s Such a page turner that I couldn’t turn the pages quick enough, and the ending was a good unexpected twist.
The characters were great, the story was amazing and the style of writing was perfect.
This is the first book that I have read by this author, I’ll be keeping my eye out for more in the future.
Thank you netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for a honest review.

This was an enjoyable thriller / mystery. I liked that it was set among the deaf community as you don't often read about dead people. They are rarely featured in literature, so it was interesting to read a book set mostly around deaf characters. I guessed the ending but still thought it was a great book!

Imagine yourself waking up and finding your baby murdered. Now imagine not being able to hear any of what's being said around you and needing someone's help to communicate with the police. Such a horrifying crime taking place in the deaf community made this story more intense and kept me invested.

The Silent House is a brilliant twist on a typical domestic thriller. The focus around Deaf and Hard of Hearing characters made me realise how rarely they are represented in fiction and how their experiences can differ so much than my own. I found this a twisty, gripping read and I enjoyed the back and forth between who I thought was the murderer. A great read and I'm really excited to read the rest of the series

Thank you to @avon and @netgalley for the gifted advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I'm sorry it has taken me such a long time to get to.

I thought I had read every type of thriller going but Nell Pattison has come along and put her own unique spin on the genre.

The author has used her back ground in Deaf education and losing her own hearing to write a remarkable book centred around a community of deaf people. What I also love about this thriller is that it isn't told by the perspective of a detective as usual, but through a British Sign Language interpreter.

Characters with disabilities are rarely seen in thrillers, in my personal experience, so I enjoyed the chance to read about this deaf community. It made me question how those who have hearing problems or who have total hearing loss would manage in the kind of situation highlighted in the book.

I enjoyed reading from the perspective of Paige, the interpreter. Emotions and conflict of interest played a large part in the story, but I found this tangled nicely with the investigation and storyline.

Overall, I flew through the book, devouring it in two sittings. And whilst I did guess correctly the final outcome of the book, it really didn't take any enjoyment away from me at all.

I thought the characters were really well developed. Combine that with a strong plot and brilliant writing and it makes fantastic reading. I'm now looking forward to reading the second in this series, Silent Night.

A good read with twists and turns to keep you guessing. I'll definitely look out for more from the author.

I enjoyed this read, it got a little slow at times but overall I really liked it. The characters were well developed and it had some good twists and turns throughout. Brilliant premise with utilizing the deaf community. Would continue to read this series.

I loved this book. The characters and the storyline. It was unusual in that most of the characters were deaf and the need for an interpreter an interesting feature

Thank you to Avon Books UK and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The premise of this book is intriguing, and it starts off well. Sadly, it then slows down to a snail's pace, and covers the same ground again. And again. And sometimes a fourth time. I have had some exposure to profoundly deaf people, so I found that aspect of the story and the perspective it gave very interesting. However, the characters are very one-dimensional, which meant I didn't get invested in any of them in the slightest. It also wasn't clear whether the book was a crime drama, or about the interpreter and her internal dialogue and relationships. The answer to "whodunnit" was fairly predictable

All in all a book with a great premise, that sadly did not live up to its potential and desperately needed more stringent editing. 2.5 stars, rounded up to 3.

The main thing lacking from The Silent House is stakes. The main character can walk away at any time, with no detriment to herself. If she fails to figure out who killed the child, there's no consequence. On the other hand, there's a whole lot of consequence to her continuing her investigation - her sister's life being in peril is one of them - but she continues anyway.

Other problems I had with the book were:

- The lack of character development and the protagonist's sheltered and overdramatic reaction to everything - Paige is absolutely stunned to witness a little boy being aggressive to his mother even though she knows he's previously broken his teacher's wrist and attacks his little sister and other children all the time. Also, hearing that Max's car matches a description given by a witness who saw Anna get run over is a punch to the gut to Paige, even though she knows it couldn't have been Max who did it because she was with him at the time of the attack on Anna... She also promises to remain calm so as not to give them away to the killer when chasing the mobile phone signal with Singh but as soon as she finds someone she suspects (without proof) of being the owner of the phone, she goes crazy like a child and screams at him in front of the entire department store, blowing their cover and embarrassing the officer who trusted her to remain professional.

- The weird logic the protagonist applies to motives that she attributes to other characters - She decides Max may have killed Lexi to encourage Elisha to leave Alan, as if the only thing keeping her in a relationship with Alan is him using her to look after his children, which she hates doing..? She's much more likely to leave him because she's sick of looking after his children, not because one of them is now dead...

Paige's outright idiocy in dangerous situations - Whilst being followed and rammed by a van in public, instead of driving to the police station to force the van to leave her alone, she drives out into the countryside onto a dark lane that has no street lighting or houses and she's "as good as blind" so the driver of the van can conveniently attack her in private.

Paige and her sister's unprofessional, nosy and immature personalities -As other reviewers have pointed out, Paige doesn't read like a 30-year-old. She comes across as double that age at least and her 28-year-old sister reads like she's 15. The police are also very unprofessional - DI Forest swearing at Paige just for sharing her theory on the child's murder, and DC Singh constantly being all touchy-feely with Paige whilst he's meant to be acting in a professional capacity.

The plodding pace of the book left me bored. I'd hoped for a story along the lines of Hush, something that really pits the wits of deaf characters against adversity and displays original and interesting ways of them ending up victorious against a child-killer, but instead it was a predictable snore-fest. The book could have been reduced by at least 1/4 if all of the pointless information was edited out and the pacing would have been improved if the protagonist had uncovered clues in ways other than just deus ex machina and long, drawn out conversations with people.

The backstory with Caitlin seemed wedged in and irrelevant. There's no way anyone with at least half a brain could blame Paige for Caitlin or Lexi's death just because at age 15, she didn't go to social services about an unrelated 8-year-old child when the child's own extended family knew what was going on and did nothing about it.

The chapters leading up to Lexi's murder created a build-up to some seemingly drastic plans that both Laura and Elisha had made separately to change their lives (the author's attempt to set them both up as suspects because we weren't told of the exact nature of the plans they had), but nothing of these plans was mentioned after the death of the little girl, so these chapters led to nothing.

The clunky, awkward prose that sounds embarrassingly amateur at times - 'This was a stupid idea,' he said, with a low growl at the back of his throat. The author also said a man's eyes danced as he smiled at her and words tumbled out of a little girl's mouth as she looked at her... Eyes can't dance, words can't tumble and did the man actually growl like a dog?

The author made it blatantly obvious who the killer was early on, along with the motive.

Overall, I was intrigued by the blurb and was excited to read something different, but unfortunately it fell flat for me and I can't see myself rushing to pick up anything else by this author in future.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a free copy in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you for the advanced copy and apologies for the delayed review.

A very well written police procedural thriller with a really interesting insight to the deaf community. I like to learn from a book and I certainly did with this one. I would highly recommend this and look forward to reading other books by this author.

What sets this book apart from other thrillers is the fact that the main characters are hearing impaired, which means that they don't hear when someone breaks into their home and murders their child. The thought of something like that happening so close is horrifying, but things are complicated when it becomes clear that the family is hiding something which may hinder the investigation.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC without obligation.

I heard nothing about this book, but was super interested based on the synopsis. I've never read a book that had this type of storyline. When I received the ARC I was super excited to check it out. While I was so excited to read it and the book had so much potential it was boring and incredibly slow paced. There is little character development and the plot line is very anti-climatic.

I am grateful for the opportunity to read this arc. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ebook. I did not enjoy this story, but that has nothing to do with the quality of the story itself; it was just not for me.

Received an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for a honest review. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own

Enjoyed reading this

This is book two starring Paige Northwood and a great story. Very well written and the story had a good pace.
Thanks to Avon books and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this novel. I love a good police procedural novel and this one fit the bill for that. I enjoyed trying to guess what was going on and enjoyed this book to the very end.