The Fells by Cath Staincliffe and narrated by Mike Rogers; Laura Brydon; Francesca Waite and Kerry Bennett is the first book of Detectives Donovan & Young series which is set in the Yorkshire Dales, in the Summer of 1997. Vicky Mott slips out the door of her remote cottage, and into the pale dawn light. She scrawls a note for her friends telling them

"she has gone to see the sunrise. V xxx"

That’s the last anyone ever hears from twenty-year-old music lover Vicky.

Is Vicky another victim of the Fellside Strangler?

That would make Vicky the fourth young woman to lose her life this summer. Snatched by a mysterious killer who stalks the fells . . .

Vicky’s body is never found.

In 2019. A skeleton is discovered in a twisty network of caves beneath the fells. Detectives Leo Donovan and Shan Young think they can finally give Vicky’s mother the closure she so desperately wants. After twenty long years of questions and anguish.

But the deeper they dig into the past, the less certain they become.

And nothing can prepare them for the shocking truth . . .. WoW!

I really enjoyed learning about the Detective Leo Donovan and Detective Shan Young. It was an excellent book, However, sadly, one of the narrators sounded like she was talking from the toilet! and sounded very distant!!! which spoilt the audiobook for me. But the story was excellent from start to finish with lots of twists and turns throughout.

A great start to a promising new series and I am looking forward to the second book in this series.

This is the first book in a new series featuring an unlikely police duo. One a well experienced 50 year old male his companion a fresh young Chinese girl, new to detective work. An unusual combination but it really adds to the story and their interactions and relationship is part of the interest. I listened to the audio version and the different character voices make each of these individuals personable and distinctive. I enjoyed this slant on police work.

The story centres on the discovery of skeletal remains in a cave on the Yorkshire Fells. Are these bones those of Vicky, a university student who went missing in 1997 whilst away with friends at a music festival? Is this death the work of a serial killer? With a dual timeline featuring Vicky’s disappearance and the murder of other young women and the present, this is complex and multi layered. Great pace, plausible characters and a cracking plot. It works.

The discovery of a skeleton in a Yorkshire cave has the police revisiting the twenty-year-old case of the Fellside Strangler, a local who killed three women and was suspected of killing a fourth, although her body was never found. Could the skeleton be the missing victim?

The Fells is the first in a new series by Cath Staincliffe and features Yorkshire-based detectives Leo Donovan and Shan Young. The pair are investigating skeletal remains discovered in a cave. It is suspected the remains belong to Vicky Mott, a young woman who went missing in 1997 and was believed to be the fourth victim of the Fellside Strangler.

As we follow the investigation, the story is intertwined with the events of 1997 when Vicky, along with a group of university friends, attended a music festival. Switching between the two storylines makes for a pacey story and ensures the victim is seen as a young and vibrant individual, rather than a set of bones. As suspicion falls on different individuals we also get a glimpse of how they fit into the original events.

It is the two detectives that really make the story. Leo Donovan is a well-established, fifty-year-old detective and very traditional in his methods. Shan Young is paired with Donovan on her first day as a newly promoted detective and couldn't be more different. Born in China and adopted as a baby she was raised in Yorkshire. The pair have nothing in common, the dynamics shouldn't work but the pair immediately click. They are willing to give each other a chance, rather than be narrow-minded. The narrators help by adding to the authentic feeling of the characters thanks to the Yorkshire accents, I felt as if I was listening to real detectives discussing a case. Glimpses into the personal lives of each detective really humanises them - and highlights the conflicts they may face in their personal lives because of their profession. I'm already looking forward to the next installment in the Donovan & Young series.

The Fells is a subtly emotional mystery that envelopes you in its melancholy, and contains some intriguing new characters you engage with almost straight away and are invested in from the get go. This is a cracking start to what I hope will be another excellent series by Cath Staincliffe.