The Whisper Man

3.5 out of 5.

An engaging thriller with a hint of the supernatural mixed in.

This is a multi-perspective thriller with a good balance between victim/s, killer and police POVs set in England with some internal themes around parenthood - specifically fatherhood - and the relationships between fathers and sons. The added reflection between the different father-son relationships in the book made for some extra content to think about in relation to the central story and characters as well as a couple of unseen twists along the way.

One part of the killer's identity was guessable but another aspect to it was hidden until late in the book and there were other reveals that I didn't see coming.

The prose was easy to read and still engaging and the main character was sympathetically written. There were some supernatural-ish elements that I can't add much more about without spoilers and some additional creep-factor moments that added to the suspense.

Worth a read and can be picked up fairly cheap (e.g. The Works, paperback, £2; Amazon Kindle ed, £2.99).

Book #4 of 2020 – The whisper man by Alex North
2 out of 5 stars

The premise of the whisper man seems promising enough, a town that was plagued by a serial killer in the past dubbed “the whisper man” is now in prison, however when a new family moves into the town, suddenly the murders recommence. The victims are said to hear the whispers of the killer before he takes them, a concept, which sounds like it would add to the intriguing mystery of the story.

However every good idea that is mentioned in the summary feels underused when it comes to the actual book. The characters are flat, the plot moves slowly and the best ideas are skimmed over. There are twists and turns in the story but they generally didn't feel deserved and seem a little too convenient. It may also be worth noting, that if you are interested in the following the (fictional) crime case mentioned in the summary, it is isn't a large portion of the story.

I read the entire book in order to know the ending but now that a few weeks have passed, the story is becoming a fading memory. I have a vague idea of how it ended but it was somewhat of an anti-climax for me so I moved on rather quickly. However, this is not a terrible book, but it strikes me as a book that emerged from an interesting premise that the author wasn't able to execute in a satisfying manner.