A Voice in the Night
DI Wilkins, Book 4
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A Voice in the Night
Narrated by:
Matt Addis
Buy Now for £17.94
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Narrated by:
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Matt Addis
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By:
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Simon Mason
DEEP DECEPTION. TWISTED FATE.
'As great a contribution to the noble British genre of detective fiction as any writer for decades' Stephen Fry
A Daily Express Book of the Year 2025
Thames Valley has a new Superintendent - DCS Wainwright - young, charismatic and ruthless, charged with pushing through big reforms. Her in-tray is full of problems - and at the top of the pile is the problem of Wilkins and Wilkins.
Trailer park boy DI Ryan Wilkins, interesting looking in baggy trackies and over-large lime-green puffa. In his personnel file is a handwritten note scribbled by the outgoing Super: 'Do not, repeat not, give him responsibility.' And posh boy DI Ray Wilkins, improbably handsome in navy blazer and tan chinos: 'Thinks too highly of himself. More experience needed at the wet end.' Their previous investigations - though somehow successful - were models of disorder and dysfunction. The new Super needs to take action.
There's been a shocking murder in the heart of Oxford, the stabbing of a security guard during an attempted armed robbery. Meanwhile, an elderly professor of linguistics goes missing from his home in cosy Iffley Village.
The high-profile murder investigation can be safely handled by reliable detective DI Hare. The entry-level enquiry into the wandering academic can be given to the problem duo, with instructions to keep it simple. But when the body of the professor is found, still dressed in his pyjamas and dripping wet, spreadeagled on a hotel lawn miles from home, things get a little unexpected for the Wilkinses. Will Ray keep on top of the brief? Will Ryan keep it together?
PRAISE FOR SIMON MASON
'Terrific' Mick Herron
'This moody, atmospheric novel is full of surprises' Sunday Times (Crime Book of the Month)
'[W]ell plotted and very funny' Sun
'This has a TV series written all over it' Daily Mail©2025 Simon Mason
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Continue the series
Critic reviews
Simon Mason's Ray Wilkins crime novels are my latest addiction. I wait impatiently for each one. What are the triple pillars of any great story? Character, Plot and Language. In the twin heroes of his novels (both called Wilkins and so unalike: they somehow create together one immortal police detective) he has created characters for the ages. His plots race thrillingly around an Oxford you never knew existed. His language though ... without exhibiting a trace of "writerly" self-consciousness, he is capable of phrase-making and description of the very highest quality. Those three perfect pillars support truly memorable crime novels, as great a contribution to the noble British genre of detective fiction as any writer for decades. (Stephen Fry)
My favourite UK series (M W Craven)
A terrific, character-driven read that makes you guess - and guess again
Simon Mason's wry sense of humour leavens the madness and mayhem, while Ryan's relationship with his four-year-old son is the emotional core of the novel. If only all procedurals could be this good.
Excellent
A hugely entertaining mystery
A Voice in The Night makes another excellent and entertaining addition to the three previous books in the series.
Simon Mason does for the British police procedural what Mick Herron has done for spy stories with Slow Horses. Mason's Oxford-set Wilkins & Wilkins books - A Voice in the Night is the fourth - are deliciously dry. His mismatched detectives, trailer park boy DI Ryan Wilkins and posh DI Ray Wilkins - who share a surname and little else - are probably the most original contribution to crime writing in a decade. Inspector Morse this ain't. Can they keep from killing each other long enough to catch baddies? Enjoy them in book form before the series justly gets gobbled up by TV. 10/10
Simon Mason's unlikely partners, DI Ryan Wilkins and DI Ray Wilkins, continue their eccentric but effective investigations in Oxford . . . Ryan's entrancing young son brings out the best in him and adds both warmth and emotional depth to the story, and a new superintendent, who wants to be addressed as 'sir', even though she's a female, adds an extra dimension. Mason writes wonderfully about both the dreaming spires of Oxford and the places near them where the homeless sleep.
DI Ryan Wilkins is both comic and tragic, set off brilliantly by posh partner-in-crime, Ray. However, it's the keenly observed human frailties and descriptions that remain with you
Another excellent book in this series
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Interesting Story.
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The best British crime series of our time
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Really enjoyed this.
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The narrator’s telling of the story
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