A missing woman – dead or gone ?

Walk Into Silence by Susan Mc Bride is a detective story set in a small Texan town. A husband calls into the police department because his wife is missing. He seems distraught but it appears that he keeps very close control of her life and finances. As Detective Jo Larsen investigates she begins to suspect that her husband may not be the innocent victim he represents himself as and that the missing women may have been hiding things. Is the woman missing by her own choice, has she died by suicide or has she been murdered ?

This is a pretty straightforward crime novel/police procedural and is intended to be the first in a series. The story of the missing woman becomes quite complicated as it appears that there are also unresolved issues with her first husband, especially relating to the death of her son. We get the victim’s story in a series of diary entries and these are interspersed with the story of the investigation undertaken by Jo and her partner Hank.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a crime novel if the investigating officer didn’t also have a traumatic past. In this case Jo has had a difficult childhood, has a mother with dementia and has an uncertain relationship with a boyfriend. She has moved away from these things to this small town but obviously her problems are following her.

This is a competently told crime novel which didn’t completely engage me. I found the way that Jo completely identified with the missing woman to be unprofessional and unbelievable but if you accept that then the rest of the story flows well and the book is entertaining enough, although I didn’t find it particularly special.