Saturday, September 12, 2020

Five crime & mystery novels featuring deaf characters

Nell Pattison's new novel is The Silent House.

At CrimeReads she tagged five crime and mystery novels in which the authors refuse to use deafness as a narrative device. One title on the list:
Resurrection Bay, by Emma Viskic

Insurance investigator Caleb Zelic was deafened at the age of five by meningitis, and clearly carries a lot of anger at the barriers this has placed in his way. As he becomes embroiled in the investigation into the death of a friend, he is forced to face his own issues surrounding his deafness, as well as some pretty violent criminals. His pride leads to a reluctance to ask for help when he needs it, and this feels really genuine, highlighting the insecurity that he feels, and Viskic has done a great job at portraying the different modes of communication he uses with different people, depending on their relationship. He has a colleague whose poor attempts at sign language add some comic relief to the darkness of the plot, a brother whose moods can be read depending on whether he will sign, and an ex-wife who knows him intimately enough to blend speech and sign in the most effective combination for him.
Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue