The Water Clock

Series: Dryden Mysteries, Book 1

By: Jim Kelly / Narrated By: Peter Silverleaf

Length: 8 hrs and 29 mins

Noir on the Fens!

Probably the best, most engaging text of this book is author Jim Kelly’s setting. The Cambridgeshire Fens creep and slam, tiptoe up with brooding cold, slice utterly with gales of freezing air, of wintry sleet. Set in the winter (tho’ it sounds like the Fens are just miserable all the time), our protagonist, journalist Philip Dryden is ever on the lookout for a good story. Something with meat to it.

Can anything be meatier than a corpse in the boot of a car pulled from frigid waters? Said corpse is practically a chunk of ice, the mutilation frozen, the head nearly severed clean off. Ahhhh, Dryden is feeling mighty fine, mighty interested.

Kelly weaves together many a thread in this story, The Water Clock. Where does one start? With Dryden’s near drowning beneath a sheet of ice whenst just a boy. Or with the near drowning once grown, the car he and his wife were driving forced from the road? Where Dryden managed to get himself from the vehicle, being saved by an anonymous Samaritan, his wife left to drown.

That she didn’t die? That she remains alive but with Locked In Syndrome, existing from day to day as Dryden suffers almost crippling guilt? All part of the story. As things become more dire (Yet another body is found, this one over 30-years old), as Dryden is drawn deeper and deeper into one pivotal crime, he also desperately tries to manipulate his assistance in order to get what he needs: The police case file for that horrific night of the accident. Who saved him? Why the coverup?

And as it so happens, he walks a fine line between journalist and detective.

Now this could be something that would normally cause m’ eyes to roll, as how on earth can this be written convincingly, aside from the usual suspension of disbelief? But Dryden’s need for answers is so great, practically all-consuming, it’s actually fairly believable. Kelly writes emotions well, and tho’ Dryden fancies himself inured to the tragedies and hardships that occur all around him, he’s really in quite a vulnerable position. He crafts several of his articles to suit the needs of the police on the case, but dang! does he need that file, or what? It’s ever on his mind, there looming as he sits at the bedside of his wife, as he listens to medical staff try to be upbeat about a woman who is, for all intents and purposes, practically dead.

There are some really grand characters in here, most notably Humph (Humphrey), the man who drives Dryden from one beguiling mishap to another. Humph spends pretty much ALL of his time in the cab he drives, so it’s really quite something when he scoots out and joins Dryden in fact-finding forays. As these quickly go south, it’s astounding that Humph sticks around through the whole thing.

That said, there are plenty of superfluous characters as well, and I caught myself wondering what they were there for. There’s Cathy, the co-worker at his paper, who creeps into his life for a private shag or two; and this in no way did anything to advance the story. All it did was give Dryden a chance (Or two) to feel shame and self-loathing about not being faithful to the wife who’s been comatose for two years. Also, when we get to the pivotal crime, characters start flying outta the woodwork. It was a trifle difficult to keep up with who was responsible for what. Where’d the money go? Who shot whom? Who ran and who lived? Kinda sorta a bit to mentally juggle whilst listening.

Which brings me to Peter Silverleaf’s performance. He was actually okay cuz, speaking of juggling, he didn’t do anything to cause me to feel that he was overacting or anything of the sort. If anything, I felt he could’ve added just a twist here or there to distinguish between characters (Oh, the maaaany characters). Still, solid job, esPECially as things were heading to the climax of the story where winds howled, lightning crashed, water flowed, flooding, destroying all in its path. Silverleaf carried it off so well, it was quite engaging.

Besides which, shotguns were involved, so I was happy. Nothing better than stuff that goes BOOM! when and where it should.

One final bit of a Boo has me patting m’self on the back for a bit here. You see, most of my first reviews of Mysteries had maaany disclaimers that the genre was new to me, and I fell for the stories, the author’s crafting hook, line, sinker, and all that. Okay, I’ve done SEVeral more since then, and I gotta tell ya: I genuinely have developed a few druthers for what I listen to, for what is acceptable, for what is annoying. Here, when all is hitting the fan for the denouement, Kelly wrote it with the whole: “Ha! Let me tell you exACTly what I did, how I did it, why I did it… before I kill you, twirling my mustache the whole time!” I’ve come to realize that’s a bit annoying, and it kinda seems a bit lazy. So minor Boo on that front.

But? Fairly enjoyable Listen, and I’m kinda considering getting Book 2, pretty much to see what happens between Dryden and his soporose wife.

Dunno, I’ll wait, I’ll see.

But for SURE am I gonna be doing another All Mysteries Week, cuz man it was such fun!