I love this series. Hill keeps many threads going and does each one justice. The characters are all well developed the story is as much about their relationships with each other as are the crimes. She does an excellent job of showing how drugs infiltrate and damage rural, idyllic towns, all for profit. Sadly, this is all too true. ( )

On par with the series generally, which is a very good standard.

Folks complain they do not like Simon . . . but Simon's not really there to be *liked.* Those things you don't like about him are debilitating neuroses, really, and are part of a character who is awful and inaccessible to a lot of the people who becomes close with. Only his sister has the patience and fortitude to put up with it, and her patience, fortitude and caring can also become a bit patience-trying. But Hill's agenda isn't making characters we immediately fall in love with, it's making realistically difficult characters, whose extraordinary abilities are set off by extraordinary flaws.

The great thing about this series is that within the framework of the crime novel, Hill is able to bring us realistic characters facing realistic problems, like deep emotional scars, mortality, loneliness and more.

If you are looking for a protagonist you can just immediately and unambiguously love, this isn't your series. If you are looking for a crime novel that always prioritizes the crime bits, this isn't your series. ( )

The trade in illegal street drugs has not played a huge role in DCS Simon Serrailler’s career with the Lafferton police force, until now. In A Change of Circumstance, when the body of a young man, dead from a heroin overdose, is discovered in a vacant flat above a Chinese pharmacy in the nearby village of Starly, the drug issue explodes out of the shadows and into the frame of Simon’s investigation. For Simon, the circumstances of the body’s discovery raise questions. Is this a straight-up overdose, he asks, or is something else going on? The criminal aspect of Susan Hill’s eleventh Serrailler procedural retains this focus on drugs, with an intricate story told from multiple perspectives. Hill’s novel features a phenomenon known as “county lines drug trafficking.” Because police in large urban centres have concentrated so much effort on battling street drugs, suppliers, distributers and traffickers have shifted their operations into smaller towns and rural areas, where, as part of an overall strategy to evade police scrutiny, they recruit children and underage youth to move the goods. The novel’s central drama is built around methods drug runners use to entice vulnerable young people into this role, courting them with favours and gifts, and then coercing them into continuing the work using blackmail and threats. The drug trade is a ruthless, cut-throat business driven by greed, fear and human weakness, and once drawn in, it’s near impossible for people who want to escape to do so. The tragic consequences of getting involved with drugs are writ large in this novel, and Simon is frustrated to realize that despite a lengthy investigation and much loss of life, the police are no closer to identifying the ringleaders than they were at the outset. In keeping with the other novels in the series, Hill fleshes out the tale with matters of personal concern to Simon and his family. His sister Cat, a doctor, and her three children feature prominently, as does Simon’s CO, Kieron Bright, who is married to Cat following the death of Cat’s first husband Chris. Simon’s solitary (and admittedly selfish) nature has kept him from settling down, but his old flame Rachel comes back into his life just as he’s contemplating a radical change in his own circumstances. It all makes for an absorbing read and leaves us with plenty of reasons to hope that we have not seen the last of Simon Serrailler. ( )

I read the first handful of books in this series, rather liked them, then kind of forgot about them. Ran across this one in the library, and thought oh, this will be nice. I've missed several in the sequence, but I think now I remember why I lost interest. I like Cat Deerbon and her family, but they have zero to do with the crime story. But Simon... ugh. His self-absorption and weird approach-avoidance with women (including coworkers and subordinates) is beyond tiresome. And of course, they all have plenty of money, so have spacious, beautiful homes and can buy another one on a whim. I missed whatever backstory there might be with Rachel, but the fact that she is - of course - beautiful, brilliant, successful, and rich is just over the top romance novel stuff. So... ick.

The drug dealing story line is vivid and scary; grief in the wake of divorce and suicide is sensitively and powerfully portrayed; parental concerns and struggles feel genuine (as far as I know - this deliberately child-free reader remains grateful for her wise decision decades ago...) and touching. So it gets two stars for those; but the main character is just a dork and I don't want to spend any more time with him. ( )

Drugs have hit hard in many areas and is it seems Lafferton itself may have a problem. Simon has become involved in a new case when a young man dies of a drug overdose in a deserted apartment. Was it self administered or murder? So begins this story, 11th in series, and another I've read from the beginning. Have grown quite fond of these characters.

Simon, his sister Cat and her family, a good mix of personal happenings and police work. Cat, as a physician adds an interesting mix, and Simon trying to come to terms with his life outside of police work is another added note. Will await the next in series to see where it goes. Good stuff. ( )