Creepy Fast-paced Fun
The best thing about Find His Grave is the atmosphere created by Kate Watterson. She’s a visual writer. You can envision the spatial relationships between characters and their environment in these Detective Chris Bailey novels; all are edgy and chilling in their own right. But with Grave she seems to dim the lights a little more and up the macabre a bit. I’m a horror fan, so I enjoyed this. Others used to slightly tamer mysteries may be a bit traumatized by all the rotting corpses and bloody handprints in this go around. To each their own. But I really enjoyed trying to unravel clues as they came for Grave more than I usually do because the material was darker and had a deeper urgency than others. Reader Andrew Ciulla adds a fresh layer of red himself by changing up his pacing, using dramatic pauses and volume variations worthy of a good, seasoned actor. I don’t think readers do this enough, and this skill is underrated. Made me wonder what kind of other acting Ciulla has done, outside of audiobook reading. You can sense he takes his job seriously. And I’m sure the author appreciates it when a true professional adds yet another dimension to an already thrilling ride. Looking forward to listening to other books read by Ciulla!