I'm reading book two right after this one, followed by book three, hopefully before the release date. It's truly a fantastic and addictive series!! I found the story to be quite repetitive. Whatever the team found out was repeated every time someone new was brought in. And I wanted to skim-read these parts. I almost gave up reading, too, at once point. but I’m glad I soldiered on. This was a good detective story, with lots of hints, a puzzling case to solve and some interesting characters for both the investigating team and the suspects. So far, the main detectives haven't fallen into the cliches that a lot of police detectives seem to fit. The author clearly loves Yorkshire and the countryside almost appears as a character in its own right. It certainly helps to drive the plot and the mystery along. It took me a bit to get used to the accent as the narrator truly captures the dialogue of the Yorkshire area. But once I did, I really appreciated the energy and emotion he brought to the story. Oldroyd’s sister, an Anglican priest, provides a bit of philosophy to the mix. I especially appreciated her comments on Hannah Arendt’s thoughts on the banality of evil. After having read several gritty thrillers over recent times, it was a pleasant respite to read a more traditional police-procedural mystery set in the countryside. The Body in the Dales brings to mind other country-based crime series, including Ann Cleeves's Vera Stanhope series set in Northumberland, Reginald Hill's Dalziel and Pascoe series, set in Yorkshire, and television series such as Heartbeat and Wycliffe.

But... If I try to ignore the narration, I can't say that much of the story actually stayed with me for very long after the book was over.I avoid the dark and gruesome in my writing and I strive to include some humour and elegance in style, a vivid sense of place and a compelling mystery! My characters both innocent and guilty are mostly ordinary people. Not a bad book overall and a decent start to a new series. (New to me that is.) I was not all that sold on the ending as there were several facts and details that cropped up right at the last minute. Storytelling was decent and contained enough of the that Yorkshire atmosphere that seems to make these books appealing. Obvious comparisons can be made to the DCI Banks novels, so if you have read any of those then this will be familiar. And finally, there was too much head-hopping for me, too many viewpoint changes – within the same paragraph at times. At times I wished there was a list of the cast of characters in the book. It’s my own fault for not paying closer attention to who’s who, but it would have been helpful, I think.

The Quartet Murders come second in the Yorkshire Murder Mysteries. It is in December, and DCI Jim Oldroyd is excited to be attending a concert where world-famous violinist Hans Muller will be performing. Not even the awful weather would dampen his mood. He would never have anticipated that this violinist would be killed by a bullet the same night. Swinging fast into action, Jim secures the crime scene and also finds the murder weapon. However, the killer is nowhere to be seen, and he had taken the victim’s priceless violin with him. How come no one saw the killer leave or even take the instrument from the violinist’s hands? Jim was there at the concert, and he did not catch the killer even after arriving at the crime scene minutes later. Is it possible that the killer was not working alone? This book is about that. Lots and lots of that. It is pretty well written and entirely readable. It has a very 'English crime' feel and in a lot of ways reminds me of Deborah Crombie's Duncan and Gemma series. Thirty Days of Darkness” by Jenny Lund Madsen – Book Review @OrendaBooks @JennyLundMadsen #ThirtyDaysOfDarkness #BookReview @edelweiss_squad @meganeturney November 26, 2023

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As a bona fide anglophile, books set in England always appeal to me. My mother was a war bride and I still have a lot of family in the 'old country'. I've read all of the James Herriot books and love the Yorkshire area. The setting, and the fact that this is a police procedural, is what attracted me to this book. Nothing to make this outstanding, but then nothing I really disliked either. Worth continuing on with the series I think.