‘Say Nothing’ by Erin Kinsley

Published by Headline,
27 February 2025.
ISBN: 978-1-472 29256-8 (PBO)

Some Small children go missing far too often, and in most cases they’re found unharmed. Four-year-old Adam Henthorn is one of the unlucky ones. His father Tommy is discovered holding the child’s lifeless body just a few hours after his disappearance was reported. DI Ryan Canfield is tasked to find Adam’s killer, and the obvious suspect is Tommy. The rest of Canfield’s team agree, as do the CPS, and ultimately a jury. Tommy is sentenced to life imprisonment.

And ten years later the real story begins. Tommy has always protested his innocence, and his case has come to the attention of a team of lawyers who pursue miscarriages of justice. New evidence comes to light; the verdict is quashed, and Tommy is a free man.

The search for the real killer follows, but that is only part of the story. Erin Kinsley is becoming known for creating rich and heart-tugging situations peopled by characters who could walk off the page into real life and Say Nothing is no exception. All the leading players and some of the minor ones have their own tales and agendas. Tommy Henthorn has a cast-iron alibi for his son’s death, but dared not admit it at the time. His estranged wife Gail has her own reasons for keeping quiet, and the guilt about her own failings as a mother is eating her up. There was just one other suspect, a young man on the autistic spectrum, and his life and that of his family has been torn apart. Ryan Canfield has already lost his marriage and the love of his life and now seems set to lose his career over mistakes made in the original investigation. Manny Pearson, his sidekick first time around, has left the force.

And then there’s the Derbyshire village setting: bleak, shabby, even more run-down ten years on, and a meticulously drawn and fitting backcloth for the misery Adam Henthorn’s murder has caused.  

Ryan Canfield’s guilt and persistence mean the real killer is revealed in the end, of course – but the novel is about much more. It explores the effect serious crime has, not only on the families affected by it, but on whole communities. And also, on the police who do the investigating, the pressure they work under to get results, and the emotional toll it takes.

The best kind of crime fiction is about the people involved and Say Nothing is up there with the best.
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Erin Kinsley is a full-time writer. She grew up in Yorkshire and currently lives in East Anglia.

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.