Product Description

A superb, atmospheric thriller from 'one of crime fiction's new stars' [Sunday Telegraph]

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7 in Books
• Published on: 2008-01-02
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

My Weekly
"A meaty, involving drama which will catch you up in an emotional rollercoaster -- great reading"

Amanda Ross
"Very spine chilling... keeps you going right until the last page"

Synopsis
Joseph Vaughan's life has been dogged by tragedy. Growing up in the 1950s, he was at the centre of series of killings of young girls in his small rural community. The girls were taken, assaulted and left horribly mutilated. Barely a teenager himself, Joseph becomes determined to try to protect his community and classmates from the predations of the killer. Despite banding together with his friends as ' The Guardians', he was powerless to prevent more murders - and no one was ever caught. Only after a full ten years did the nightmare end when the one of his neighbours is found hanging from a rope, with articles from the dead girls around him. Thankfully, the killings finally ceased. But the past won't stay buried - for it seems that the real murderer still lives and is killing again. And the secret of his identity lies in Joseph's own history...

Customer Reviews

A quiet belief
I have never written a book review before but feel must write to recommend this book,especially as I probably would not have read it myself if it had not been our book club choice. What can I say? Just READ IT and find out for yourself. A Quiet Belief is the first book I had read by R J Ellory, but had to read some more. So, this week have read Candlemoth - his first published novel and another brilliant read.

Very involving read
I found the book to very involving and it sucked me right in. From its initial innocence of of the main character to how he developed later in life. The pace of the book was just right, starts slow and picks up pace in the second half.

One gripe I did have (and this is with most crime books), is that the authors never touch on why the bad guys do those things, as in this book, there was no real motive given for the bad guy, had a great opportunity but it seemed as though Ellory wanted to avoid the dark nature of the villain. We knew who he was and the protagonist touched on the reasons why those bad things MAY have been done, but thats all.

All in all a great read and highly recommended.

P.S. Steer clear of The Stand (Stephen king) as suggested by Ellory for other books to read.

A Quiet Belief in Angels
Spanning over nearly 50 years, A Quiet Belief in Angels tells the story of Joseph Vaughan, whose life has always been a tragedy. Growing up in the 1940s, he was at the centre of series of killings of young girls in his small rural community of Augusta Falls. The girls were taken, assaulted and left horribly mutilated. Barely a teenager himself, Joseph becomes determined to try to protect his community and classmates from the killer.

How do I review such a beautifully written and completely engrossing book, with such powerful storytelling and truly haunting imagination? I read a lot of crime thillers and this one is one of the best and much more. There's no troubled cop as the main character, just a innocent twelve year old boy who's story bgins with the death of his father, followed by his community being terrorised by a mysterious and faceless killer who preys on young girls and shocks Joseph beyond any fear he could ever imagine.

Although the story is told from the present with Joseph as a middle-aged man, the narrative changes throughout the whole story, ranging from the innocent and unknowning thoughts of the young Joseph to the experienced and troubled mind of his older self. There are many hints and clues to the story's outcomes through the book too, many of which that I noticed when reading are highlighted in the Reading Group Notes at the back of the book, so I recommend not reading these until afterwards. The killer is fairly obvious once you get near the end but the way it is written is pure genius. I literally didn't see the ending rolling itself out until I was reading it when all of the pieces were fitting into place.

With so many important world events from the time the book is based, Ellory must have done his research on the subjects he touched on, from World War II to the Kennedy assassination to the Moon landing, which are all extremely accurate and give a lot more realism to the story. A lot of 20th Century American history is also covered so when I found out that Ellory is an author who lives in the UK I was very surprised.

I do have a couple of niggles about this book - in particular, in the second half of the book, when Joseph moves on to New York, a lot of new characters were introduced in rapid succession, which was very different to the beginning where each character was discribed in some depth when introduced to the story. It also jumps quite a few years when he is in prison and didn't go into much detail about what his experiences were there and the people he met (other than the brothers), which I would have thought would have really been good to add to the story. I can only think that Ellory didn't want to introduce anymore unneccessary characters or make the book any longer than it was.

Overall this is one of the greatest works of fiction I have ever read and I will definitely give R.J. Ellory's other novels a read in the near future. This is a shocking yet beautiful story that is one I will most certainly read again and one that I will remember for a long time and one that I am going to recommend to everyone. A real "must buy"!