A Bird in the Hand

Palmer-Jones, Book 1

By: Ann Cleeves

Narrated by: Sean Barrett

Ann Cleeves Classic Crime—engaging mysteries to savour, beloved characters to meet again

A Bird in the Hand is the first mystery novel featuring George and Molly Palmer-Jones by Ann Cleeves, author of the Shetland and Vera Stanhope crime series.

In England’s birdwatching paradise, a new breed has been sighted–a murderer....

Young Tom French was found dead, lying in a marsh on the Norfolk coast, with his head bashed in and his binoculars still around his neck. One of the best birders in England, Tom had put the village of Rushy on the birdwatching map. Everyone liked him. Or did they? George Palmer-Jones, an elderly birdwatcher who decided quietly to look into the brutal crime, discovered mixed feelings aplenty. Still, he remained baffled by a deed that could have been motivated by thwarted love, pure envy, or something else altogether.

But as he and his fellow ‘twitchers’ flocked from Norfolk to Scotland to the Scilly Isles, in response to rumours of rare sightings, George–with help from his lovely wife, Molly–gradually discerned the true markings of a killer. All he had to do was prove it...before the murderer strikes again.

©2015 Ulverscroft (P)2015 Ulverscroft

Narrator killed it for me, otherwise good

The narrator is a good reader, but not the best actor. I had a hard time distinguishing between characters when their was only dialogue to go by. The tone of his voice is very soothing, to the point where I found my mind wandering sometimes.

I enjoyed the story. It wasn't predictable but it was solveable.

Not What I’ve Come to Expect from Ann Cleeves

I choose this because I’ve listened to most of her books and thoroughly enjoyed them. Some may enjoy the storyline but I was quite bored. Narrator was sleep inducing. Not my cup of tea so I will stick to her other series in future.

this book did not hold my attention for very long.

even 7 hours was too long for this book. I barely made it through without falling asleep at 7 times

Not her best

Narration seemed dull compared to Vera and Jimmy perez series. Character development occurred too late in the story.

Too much twitching, but otherwise intriguing

The narration was just right. It sounded exactly the way I imagined George would talk and think. I found all the descriptions of and dialogue about the twitchers to be somewhat tedious, but in the end, I realized it was necessary to establish the near-manic, obsessive nature of the activity. I, too, will start Book 2.

Better than Two Rivers series, but…

This leaves a lot to be desired. The narrator is grim and depressing. I may try speeding up the recording to see if he’s more tolerable that way, but right now it’s like listening to someone read the classifieds. I’m not feeling the main characters either. We are given very little to get to know them. I love the setting and the birds information, but I’d rather have more Vera and Shetland Islands books any day!

Past its time

I really wanted to like this book. The plotting was good, the ending a surprise, the mechanics of birding were sound. However, the way women were described & treated in this book was horrendous, even tho the writer is a woman. When I went to check on the original publication date, it was 1986. I won't be reading any more of this series.

The Birds deserve better...

This is the first of the Palmer-Jones couple mysteries by the prolific and successful and usually highly competent Ann Cleeves. For me characters, setting and the mystery are the key ingredients. In an audiobook, the narrator's skills and range also come in to play. I got this in hopes that it would be transporting in the way a good mystery can be. There's lots of potential with this series and I might have enjoyed it more reading rather than listening. The narrator was competent but limited by a ponderous rather grim tone that colored the whole story. At times it felt like I was trapped with a depressive, which can be just fine in a story, but not my taste. As for the story itself - strained credibility to me - a twitcher is murdered on the marsh on a Saturday morning. A local magistrate asks PJ to privately investigate because he's worried about his adolescent son who's a twitcher. The set up is a strain, but hey, it's a mystery, it happens. The ridiculous part is that over the course of the next week, there is zero apparent police activity, so our amateur detective has the field to himself (with his wife as empathetic sidekick). Even more of a strain, is the fact that all of the suspects are surprisingly open to his snooping. There's significant (too much) soul searching by our detective who seems to see this case rather self-referentially as a challenge to his own skills, judging everything in terms of it's impact on his varying self image of competence/skill. Some good character development and an enticing enough setting, but though the ingredients are present, the recipe for this needs work. I will be cautious about further entries in this series.

Loved book one

I thought the setting, characters and story was very good. I’m going to begin reading book 2

Excellent

A new series by Ann Cleeves and it’s fantastic. And birding is again a big part