Review by joshkiba13 - The Whisper Man

joshkiba13 's review for:

The Whisper Man by Alex North

4.0

dark mysterious tense

I could tell less than 50 pages into this that I was going to read every book by this author. His prose style is actually pretty similar to my own, which is great since I’m currently looking for comp titles for my novel.

The characters in this book were really great, and I felt invested in each of the main three: Tom Kennedy, a young father and widower recently moved into town. Jake, Tom’s son, who has a ghost friend, a Packet of Special Things, and a hard time opening up to his dad. And D.I. Pete Willis, an aging detective haunted by the possible return of an unsolved case of twenty years. I was intrigued by the inner conflict that each character had in addition to the kidnappings and murders in Featherbank: Tom struggles with the loss of his wife and to connect with and understand his son; Jake is haunted by the death of his mother and sees things outside of our realm of reality; Pete teeters on the edge of alcoholism but strives to stay sober due to what he has lost.

I loved the lore of the Whisper Man and how present that legend is in the town. There were several scenes that were pretty creepy, mostly in Tom and Jake’s house. I do wish the whispering would have been shown a little more rather than just being talked about, but in either case, it was an overall very atmospheric story.

About halfway through there’s a surprising twist about two of the characters’ relationship to each other. After overcoming that shock, I really enjoyed how that played out in the story and how they had to reckon with past guilt, fallible memory, and forgiveness.

North did a great job raising the stakes and building tension across the story. I read the last 130 pages in one day. My slight gripe is that the last act felt a little rushed, and the story left off with now a lot of breathing room to resolve some of the conflicts. I loved who the new killer ended up being, but I wish we’d spent a fair amount of more time with that person so we could really delve into the psychology of those choices. One character had a great arc but was killed off before it could come into full fruition, which happens . . . but I was disappointed. I dunno, I do the same thing in my own book, so I guess I can’t complain lol. I suppose it’s a sign that that character was really well written.

I already have a copy of The Shadows, which may or may not be a continuation of this book(?). In any case, I am eager to read it and The Angel Maker, as well as anything else North publishes afterward. Great story.

Content Warnings