RJ Elliott quietly goes about writing exceptional thrillers and this is no exception as he paints a devastatingly bleak and accurate description of life and death in a high security prison and the horrendous effects of wardens coping with the stress of helping to administer death sentences.

The writing is lyrical and descriptive and the characters and plot draw you in.

I really enjoyed this thought provoking book and heartily recommend it.

There are some books that just stay with you forever. They may not be your favourites or the best written books but something about them just mean you never forget them.

One of those books, for me, is one of Ellory's previous novels - A Quiet Belief in Angels. Its hard to put my finger on why I loved it so much other than I think it was the first time I realised that crime fiction could also be literary. I think there can some snobbery around crime fiction that some writers, academics, literary judges think it is beneath them but A Quiet Belief in Angels taught me that such snobbery is completely misplaced.

Since then, I have followed RJ Ellory's career and was so pleased to be given the opportunity to remember why I fell in love with his writing all those years ago. The Bell Tower is part of a prison, more accurately an execution chamber, where Garrett Nelson finds himself working after being medically retired from the Sheriff's department.

Understandably, the darkness hanging over such a place soon casts a shadow over Garrett however with a new partner, he continues to seek out the light. However, when Garrett meets an inmate scheduled for death in the coming months, and realises there is far more to his story than meets the eye, he wonders whether an innocent man will soon be put to death.

As with his previous novels, the writing here is beautiful and poetic. The sense of darkness hanging over such a prison, and the brutal effect it has on staff and prisoners alike jumps off the page and casts a shadow over the reader. Only writers like Ellory could really do it justice.

Obviously, I can only provide a brief synopsis given that anything further would be a spoiler, however I would encourage anyone not familiar with his work to remedy that asap!

Thanks to Netgalley and Orion Publishing Group | Orion for an ARC in exchange for an honest review