AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! From Ann Cleeves–New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of the Vera and Shetland series, both of which are hit TV shows–comes the stunning new Vera Stanhope novel, The Darkest Evening. “Ann Cleeves is one of my favorite mystery writers.”–Louise Penny “As a huge fan of both the Shetland and Vera series of books, I had high expectations for …
“As a huge fan of both the Shetland and Vera series of books, I had high expectations for Cleeves’ latest. . . . A stunning debut for Cleeves’ latest crimefighter.”–David Baldacci on The Long Call
On the first snowy night of winter, Detective Inspector Vera Stanhope sets off for her home in the hills. Though the road is familiar, she misses a turning and soon becomes lost and disorientated. A car has skidded off the narrow road in front of her, its door left open, and she stops to help. There is no driver to be seen, so Vera assumes that the owner has gone to find help. But a cry calls her back: a toddler is strapped in the back seat.
Vera takes the child and, driving on, she arrives at a place she knows well. Brockburn is a large, grand house in the wilds of Northumberland, now a little shabby and run down. It’s also where her father, Hector, grew up. Inside, there’s a party in full swing: music, Christmas lights and laughter. Outside, unbeknownst to the revelers, a woman lies dead in the snow.
As the blizzard traps the group deep in the freezing Northumberland countryside, Brockburn begins to give up its secrets, and as Vera digs deeper into her investigation, she also begins to uncover her family’s complicated past.
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It was the perfect time to return to the bleakness of Northumbria in the days leading up to the Winter Solstice. I enjoyed the modern country house party disturbed by the arrival of Vera Stanhope — with a baby. Glorious!
When I decided to read The Darkest Evening by Ann Cleeves, I had not realized it was part of a series. Even so, I was able to read and enjoy it as a standalone and am excited to read more of the series. As the story begins, Vera finds an abandoned car with a toddler still inside, but no one else. She takes the child and finds sanctuary in Brockburn, which is the place her father grew up in and belongs to her estrange. What follows is the mystery of what happened to the toddler’s mother and dives into her past. The story was a captivating mystery with engaging characters.
Happy reading!
4.5 Stars! Intricate, clever and engrossing!
In this splendid ninth installment in the Vera Stanhope series, The Darkest Evening, Cleeves has written an unpredictable, pacey, police procedural that sees quirky Det. Insp. Vera Stanhope immersed in a new murder investigation close to her estranged family home, Brockburn, when during a cold blustery evening she unexpectedly happens upon an abandoned car on the side of the road with a door left wide open and a toddler crying inside.
The writing is polished and precise. The characters are eccentric, secretive, and methodical. And the plot is a compelling tale full of twists, turns, red herrings, secrets, obsession, deduction, duplicity, manipulation, familial drama, and murder.
Overall, The Darkest Evening has an intriguing, well-developed storyline with exceptional character development, and is another fantastic addition to this shrewd, compulsive, well-loved series.
Wow…wow..another unputdownable book from Ann Cleeves.
It’s always become a personal case for me, the journey to find out the truth, what kind of person the victim was, what’s the connection between each suspects, what’s the motive, it’s just so engrossing, and when the secrets unveiled one by one, the pain, the struggle, the tragic truth, I can’t not feeling all those things, it’s so heartbreaking when everything finally revealed.
The characters are so strong, I’m so infatuated with the victim and really admire all the detectives, everyone left a big impressions in the end.
Captivating mystery thriller with amazing characters, totally recommended for everyone who loves mystery read.
The Darkest Evening is the ninth book in Ann Cleeves’s Vera Stanhope series. Heading home after a long day on a snowy midDecember evening, Vera takes a wrong turn and comes upon a stranded car, driver’s door open and a car seated toddler in the backseat. With no sign of the driver and any footprints obliterated by the driving snow, Vera puts the child, car seat and all, into her old Land Rover and sets out to find the driver. As she had seen no one as she came, Vera proceeds towards distant lights.
These lights turn out to be coming from the ancestral home of her dishonored late father, Hector. By all rights, she should be able to get out of the storm and be able to call in what has happened as cell service is sporadic at best in this region. Vera arrives as her distant cousin Juliet and her husband Mark are holding a dinner party to raise funding for an arts project to keep the old homestead from crumbling. Jane, not wanting to interfere with Juliet’s gathering, takes the child to the kitchen and meets with her housekeeper, Dorothy. As Vera awaits help to find the missing driver, a neighbor reports that he has found a dead person in the snow in behind the mansion.
In a convoluted story that seems to pull in possibilities from all over the region, Vera and her crew travel far and wide seeking to find out who killed the delicate young mother. Between the many rural rumors and the actual truth, the story meanders until the riveting conclusion.
This story is so good! I had many guesses as to the culprit, none of them accurate! This story held me spellbound until the very end. I really enjoyed this well plotted mystery and I do recommend it!
* ARC provided by publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Truthfully, I was kind of hesitant about reading this because when I requested the ARC, I’d mistakenly thought I was getting book #2 in her newest Two Rivers series, but I managed to land in #9 in the Vera Stanhope universe. Oops! After peeking around I saw that a few other readers said it works as a standalone which encouraged me to read it anyway. I had absolutely no trouble at all getting in to this. Cleeves has a very inviting way about her stories and I never felt that I was missing anything that was pertinent to Vera’s background or that of her inspectors, Joe and Holly. I’ll add that I’ve seen maybe two or three episodes of the Vera TV series so having those images in mind helped me picture the setting better.
The story itself is what I love about mysteries – tantalizing, suspenseful, thoughtful. Vera, who’s such a unique personality, adds humanity to the victims and I love how she can barrel through and not give any f’s. Her detective work is fascinating as she’s a no frills, gritty kind of personality. She’s not infallible but there’s something at once admirable and intimidating about her. The dynamics between Vera, Holly and Joe are equally interesting as they show how they work in unison and independently of each other. I also liked gaining insight as to how Vera relies on each of them for specific things e.g. Joe is always good about reeling her back in if she gets too far ahead of herself. In return, she encourages but doesn’t coddle. I also liked getting a peek into Vera’s family’s background as there’s a sort of unexpected reunion thanks to their links to the murder victim.
I was able to guess the ‘whodunit’ though I came to that conclusion from a different angle; I don’t think my guesswork would hold up to Vera’s standards The Darkest Evening is what I enjoy best about British mysteries. It’s compelling without relying on being graphic. The characters gradually shed their layers as they react to tighter scrutiny, and that’s what makes Cleeves stories so exciting to me. I will absolutely go back and start this series from the beginning!
The Darkest Evening by Ann Cleeves is another outstanding Vera Stanhope mystery. There’s plenty of introspection in this novel as the crime is committed on the property of Vera’s estranged family. This is the “big” house from which her father had been banished years before and it rankled. It was a blizzard when Vera, too stubborn to listen to reason and stay in town, misses a turn and list, comes upon an abandoned car left, with its door open. Inside is a baby/toddler strapped into a car seat, no hint of an adult anywhere nearby. Vera unstraps the car seat and reinstalls it, infant and all, into her own car to continue her journey. Suddenly she knows exactly where she is: the family estate. As she arrives at the front door, it becomes obvious there is a party in progress, but she enters and is taken to the kitchen where the housekeeper supplies the baby with a new nappie, and Vera with a bowl of soup. Before long, a neighboring farmer, arriving to collect his daughters who had been waiting table, arrives to report her has seen a dead body out in the snow. Fortunately the police have already arrived, in the form of Vera. And so it begins…
Vera is a complicated character who embodies many of the emotions felt by women everywhere, making her a very sympathetic trope. She is older, alone, not particularly attractive or well-turned out. She is however, tenacious and bright. She runs on adrenaline much of the time and susses out the truth before her colleagues and even her readers. She is the epitome of a capable, but lonely, woman. She is worthy of admiration. This was a good mystery, with two people dead, and several families with the potential of being destroyed. Like a hound with a bone, Vera follows every lead, endangering herself more than once, until the killer is found. It was an extremely satisfying read. Dark and curious, challenging and emotional. I recommend it.
I was invited to read a free ARC of The Darkest Evening by Netgalley. All opinions and interpretations contained herein are solely my own. #netgalley #thedarkestevening
This book started out strong. It had great potential and was a somewhat good story. I had a few problems though. A car on the side of the road with the door open. A baby inside. A cop, Vera, getting lost??? I can’t believe the cop who was headed home got lost. That was a bit out there but I could overlook that. She takes the baby and goes to a house close by where a dinner party is taking place. Also she is related to the owner. When Vera finds there is a dead woman on the property she does not tell the guests to stay put. She does not make the house a crime scene and demand that everyone present separate and not discuss things. She’s supposed to be a seasoned DI and yet she does not treat this crime the way I would have expected. I didn’t find that believable. There were just some things about this that didn’t read right. But I was still interested and wanted to know who killed this young woman and why.
This book takes you through a lot, including two murders and a kidnapped baby. It’s got some twists and the descriptions are quite vivid. Maybe a bit much at times but still good. You will feel the cold in this book. The deep snow and the pain the middle aged DI feels while trying to solve this case. I don’t mean mental pain either. She’s feeling the pain in her job, walking, running, falling, being attacked. I would have loved this book if it would not have read more like a Murder She Wrote episode or even a Colombo in part. Vera could get on a nerve for sure. But she did do a good job and did catch the killer. I didn’t at all guess who it was. Though it may have been because I was losing interest by this point. I hate when books do this to me.
This book honestly had great potential and it may just be me in that I didn’t like the slowness it took. It starts out with a bang and then kind of drags. It finally did pick back up but at almost the end. It just was not my kind of book. It was more of a mystery than a thriller which would be ok if it would have held my attention better. It was just ok for me.
Thank you #NetGalley, #AnnCleeves, #StMartin’sPress for this ARC. This is my own review.
I gave it a 3/5 stars. I say read it for yourself and decide. It was just not for me. Sorry.
I received a free electronic copy of the ARC of this British police procedural from Netgalley, Ann Cleeves, and St. Marin’s Press – Minotaur. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this novel of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work. The ninth novel featuring Vera Stanhope in this mystery series, The Darkest Evening stands alone and is a concise, quick read, and entertaining. You can’t go wrong with Ann Cleeves.
The majority of the action in this very active novel takes place in rural Northumberland, and we have the perspective of several first-person characters. Though the action is fast, the plot flows nicely and it’s fairly easy to keep up. Vera is a character easy to appreciate and Ann Cleeves is an author I follow.
Any book written by Ann Cleeves is a joy to read. Put Vera in it and it becomes even better. The Darkest Evening is book 9 in the Vera Stanhope series but works just fine as a standalone with detailed character descriptions and backstory. However, if you’ve read any of the previous books, or watched any of the TV series, that’s a bonus, because Vera is already a familiar character. Her methods, her nature, her childhood, her surroundings.
When The Darkest Evening opens it’s a dark evening indeed. Stubborn Vera has decided that yes, she can make it home just fine, thank you, even though it’s starting to snow and the weather forecast is not good. Turns out visibility isn’t so great after all, Vera misses a turn, becomes a little lost, and discovers a car parked on the side of the road that seems abandoned until she hears a small cry. Someone has left their car, door open, with a toddler strapped into the back seat. When she gets her bearings she realizes she is near the elegant country home, Brockburn, where her father grew up. Where she has family. But no warm and fuzzy memories.
She takes the child to the estate. As the weather worsens, the body of a young woman is discovered in the snow. And we’re off. Anyone who thinks they can match wits against rumpled, disheveled, abrupt Vera and come out ahead is in for a surprise. There are a lot of secrets and therefore a lot of possible suspects, including family and people from the nearby town that Vera knows from her childhood. Vera is nothing if not determined. Her methods may not always seem to fall within some accepted norm, but she has a strong moral core that drives her to do what is right and seek justice for those who have been harmed. So with Vera digging in, secrets won’t remain secret for long.
As is the case with everything author Cleeves writes, The Darkest Evening is cleverly and smoothly plotted, with twists and turns and surprises that increase the suspense page by page. Her team is back as well, and watching them take this case apart is so satisfying.
Ann Cleeves has done it again. A terrific story that will keep you engaged until the very end and leave you wanting to read the next book at once. And amazingly, as with her series Shetland, the characters in the books and on the TV screen are one and the same. As I stated at the beginning, always a joy. Thanks to the author and St. Martin’s Press for providing an advance copy of The Darkest Evening via NetGalley. I thoroughly enjoyed it and recommend it without hesitation. All opinions are my own.
Ann Cleeves is a new author to me, hence, I hadn’t read any of the previous novels in her Vera Stanhope series. Still, I dove in with eager anticipation, drawn to the intriguing premise of this retro-style murder mystery. While I enjoy a good whodunnit, between the quirky characters and a disjointed storyline, I had a hard time remaining totally engaged. However, if I had read the previous books in this series, my overall take might be slightly different. Still, I found “The Darkest Evening” to be decent story, overall, and I want to express my thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for allowing me the opportunity to explore a new author and series.
Vera Stanhope, a police detective, is driving home in a snowstorm, soon realizing that she should have stayed where she was until the storm passed. The snow is getting deeper and she is disoriented. When she comes upon a car stopped on the side of the road, she notices the door open and a child strapped on the back seat. With no parent in sight, she leaves a note plus her card and takes the child with her. Down the road, Vera realizes she is at Brockburn, home of the Stanhope family.
The Stanhope family is in the middle of a weekend party for some friends. As they need money to keep the house going, they have decided to turn part of it into a theater and thus have asked guests to contribute to it.
Vera is a relative of the Stanhope family but her father is a black sheep. The family doesn’t look kindly on her either. However, they bring her and the child inside. The child is a little boy and is the son of Lorna Falstone, a young woman who has suffered for many years from an eating disorder. The family knows her but they don’t know who the father is. When a body is found outside the house, it turns out to be Lorna and she has been bludgeoned to death. Now, Vera brings in her slew of police to investigate the death.
When another woman is found murdered, members of the town get really nervous wondering who the killer could be and why are they killing women? Vera relies on her police cohorts to help her. They work very long and dangerous hours out in the dark looking for the killer.
This is the first of the Vera Stanhope police series I have read. I admit that I had a difficult time getting into the story and it seemed to drag in spots. The personality of Vera is compelling and the descriptions of the area and the COLD weather kept me reading. The more I read, the more I realized how thankful I am that I live in Florida! I believe this is the Northumbria area book I have read too. Vera is one tough old bird!
Copy provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Driving home during a snow storm, DCI Vera Stanhope comes across an abandoned car with a toddler inside. Taking the child she drives to the nearest house which happens to belong to her relations where a dinner party is in progress. Not long after at the back of the house a body is discovered.
But what could the possible motive be, Stanhope and her team investigate.
An entertaining well-written modern crime story with its interesting cast of characters. A fine addition to the series.
This was my first story in the Vera Stanhope Series. I think it would add a little to reading this book for some of the character dynamics, but it isn’t necessary. The book starts out with Vera encountering an odd situation. This leads her to encountering a murder and a bit of a homecoming. The story had a lot of potential suspects which give us some twists and turns as the murderer is revealed. The book moved along at a good pace. I enjoyed the story and found the ending a bit of a surprise. I received a copy from NetGalley and am voluntarily leaving a review.
This is the first book I read by Ann Cleeves but I had seen the first couple of seasons of the Vera TV-series so I was looking forward to reading this book. Having formed a visual picture what Vera looked like by how the actress portrayed her on TV made it easy to put that in effect while reading the book. The descriptions of the various characters and landscapes were great that you didn’t need to have seen Vera on TV or read the previous books but for me it added to the enjoyment, already put some of the previous books on my wish list.
Ann Cleeves writing style is very easy to read and I had a hard time putting it down. I stayed up reading way past my bedtime.
I made a lot of guesses during the story and I ended up been wrong on each one of them. It really was a surprise for me to find out who the murderer was
This shows you that the impression of a stable family relationship can be very misleading.
The book is full of family secrets that keep you guessing till the end.
I’m a devoted fan of Ann Cleeves’ character Vera Stanhope. Frequently, I find police procedurals can be a bit flat, but that is never the case with DCI Stanhope.
The characters of Vera and her crew, Joe and Holly, are so well developed, and the view into their personal life makes the series much more interesting. In The Darkest Evening, readers get a particularly good peek at Vera’s family’s skeletons. Her estranged family is heavily featured in this latest installment of the series, and that pushes Vera and her family to face some unresolved matters.
The setting of atmospheric Northumberland is made to feel more isolated and chilling with the addition of a road-closing blizzard. Everything is turned upside down in the small community when bodies are found, but there also secrets, deceptions, infidelities and betrayals that float to the top like the bloated body of a drowning victim. I found The Darkest Evening to be an engaging page-turner.
I’ve read a few books by this author and after reading this realize I need to read more. The way she crafts a story is truly beautiful. We, the readers are drawn in to a beautifully crafted complex murder mystery with many twists and turns along the way. She uses her intellect and skills as a detective to try to figure out is guilty and or complicit in the murder of a young mother and left her baby out in the cold to freeze to death. Not an easy task as there are so many possibilities and potentially guilty people, most that she knows quite well as she is related to many of them and who are not particularly nice people. They generally think they are better than most and treat Vera and anyone who is not of their “ilk” with disdain, disrespect and because they are wealthy believe the law does not apply to them. Along the way she learns a great deal about her father and her family’s very complicated past. It is so wonderful to have a main character that is represented as a smart, grown successful woman who doesn’t need a man to prove her worth as a human or in a job that many used to consider and some still do as a “man’s” job and does not take guff from those who try to denigrate her. Clear your schedule , grab the book and get comfy. Once you start this book you won’t want to put it down until you find out who the guilty ones are. It is so worthy of your time.
Don’t ya just love a book that starts out: On the first snowy night of winter….
Vera left work, regardless of the snow coming down, thinking it would be okay. After all, she’s a cop. What can happen? An abandoned car. Except for the child left alone in the backseat. Okay, I am rubbing my hands together, ready to get down to business.
I love complicated family dynamics and Vera’s family is definitely that. People’s lives will be changed and the change is not all bad. I feel Holly stole the show and I want you to meet her for yourself to see why.
The action was not slow, but methodical, like a police procedural. The pacing, danger and suspense picked up near the end and with so many suspects, I was unable to figure it out until Vera filled me in.
For some reason, British thrillers don’t usually quite get there for me. I don’t know if it is a stiffness that comes through in the writing or if it’s me, myself, and I. That doesn’t stop me from reading and enjoying them, and this is not my first Ann Cleeve novel, so that proves my point.
I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of The Darkest Evening by Anne Cleeves.
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This is the first book that I have read in this series and I was able to enjoy it as a standalone. From the moment that Detective Inspector Vera finds the abandoned car with the baby in it, I know that Vera will not rest until she finds out what happened to the missing mother. I received a free copy of this ebook from the publisher through Netgalley. This is my honest and voluntarily given review. This is a terrific mystery. I like how Vera was able to count on her team even in the middle of the night after a long day. I like how Vera is not intimidated by her upper class relations and is not afraid to ask anyone a question. There is some British slang and terms used, but I was able to quickly look them up. I like that it took me to the end of the book to determine who was the father of Lorna’s baby as well as the identity of the murderer. There are many interesting characters in the book. I look forward to seeing Holly and Joe in future books. This is such a good read that I plan to go back and read the previous books in this series.
Who killed little Thomas’ young mother?Kept me guessing all the way
I loved the setting, the plot, the varied cast of characters and the author’s facility at building a mystery with so many twists and red herrings. I really never guessed the culprit until Vera Stanhope risks her life to get the full story from the murderer’s own mouth.
This was my first time reading a novel by Ann Cleeves and I can certainly understand why she has won over so many readers and her works have made their way to television. I first heard of her works in an Australian author’s novel and then learned that Cleeves sets her police procedural mysteries in some of my favorite settings. A perfect fit for me and I love Vera Stanhope’s careless appearance and self-confidence. She dares a “take me as I am” attitude that many male detective leads sport and it’s refreshing to have a woman detective to match their nonchalance about appearance and physical fitness while powering doggedly to a successful result.
No question about it, I am now a fan.
Thanks to publisher Macmillan and NetGalley for providing an advance copy of the book; this is my voluntary and honest review.