I do love a Val McDermid book, and Silent Bones was no exception. The book thoroughly absorbed me in the two days immediately prior to Christmas 2025.

Silent Bones is well paced, featuring short punchy chapters as DCI Pirie, DS Murray and DS Mortimer juggle the demands of two cases. The plot is liberally sprinkled with insightful contemporary realism and Scottish vernacular, together with Val McDermid's signature dry wit coming to the fore in the dialogue between the central characters. Karen Pirie is a compelling and complex heroine, whose professional success seems destined not to be mirrored in her personal life.

I'd enthusiastically recommend Silent Bones to series devotees. I believe it could be read as a standalone or entry point to the series by those who haven't yet read the previous books, although there are very significant series-level character arcs and background plot lines that reward reading the series in publication order.

Thanks to the author, Queen of Crime Val McDermid, publisher Grove Atlantic | Atlantic Crime and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this title.