The Redeemed by M R Hall

Paperback:  The body of a dead man is discovered in an overgrown cemetery in Bristol, the sign of the cross gouged into his flesh.  At first it seems to coroner Jenny Cooper that all the evidence points to a horrific and tragic suicide.

Then an enigmatic young priest, Father Lucas Starr, arrives on Jenny's doorstep, entreating her to hold an inquest into the death of Eva Donaldson, a high-profile political campaigner whose past life haunted her.

A young man, Paul Craven, has recently been sentenced for Eva's brutal murder.  But, despite Craven's conviction and the evidence against him, Father Lucas is convinced of the man's innocence.

Jenny's investigations into Eva's death will lead her to a powerful new religious organization and to those who control it.  When it later emerges that the man found in the cemetery was also a member of the group, Jenny discovers that more could link the deaths of these victims than she could have realized.

Jenny's lone quest for justice takes her to the dark heart of an establishment that wishes to silence her, and on an inner journey to confront ghosts that have haunted her for a lifetime.

For coroner Jenny Cooper answers to no one but the dead.

First paragraph in the book:  Jenny was drinking cordial by the stream at the end of her overgrown garden, watching a school of tiny brown trout flick this way and that, quick as lightning.  It was late June and the sweet-smelling breeze was warm against her bare legs.  Before the telephone intruded she had managed to lose herself - how long for, she couldn't say - hypnotized by the gently swaying ash trees and the buzz of grasshoppers in the nettles.

About the author:  M R Hall is a screenwriter, producer and former criminal barrister.  The Redeemed (2011) is the third novel in his excellent Jenny Cooper series, following Gold Dagger-shortlisted debut The Coroner and The Disappeared.  Educated at Hereford Cathedral School and Worcester College, Oxford, he lives in Monmouthshire with his wife and two sons.  Aside from writing, his main passion is the preservation and planting of woodland.  In his spare moments, he is mostly to be found among trees.

M R Hall tells us about The Redeemed:



Rating:  5/5