Voices of Angels

Author: Darlene Oakley
Genre: Contemporary Romance/Suspense

After shooting a teen during a jewellery store robbery, Halifax police officer Daniel Howard (Dany) takes stress leave and respite at his grandmother's house on the Bay of Fundy. While sifting through some of her things, he discovers a message in a bottle in her attic, an object he and Nan had found decades before. As he fights to recover from the trauma of the shooting, and finds the courage to hold a gun again, he undertakes a personal mission to find the person who wrote the message in the bottle.
 
Julia McIntyre is a well-known Christian performing artist whose brother was killed by a stalker during a stage performance. As Julia cradled her brother’s lifeless body, the killer slipped away in the ensuing chaos. Ravaged by depression and deserted by her husband, she hides away, locked in a prison of fear and grief.
 
In an effort draw out her brother’s killer, at the encouragement of the investigating officer, Julia steps out into public and is determined to return to a normal life—but there’s no denying the terror lurking in her heart and around every corner—until Dany appears on her doorstep.
 
As their hearts are inexplicably drawn together, Dany and Julia must unravel long lost family secrets to get inside the mind of a killer before Julia’s voice is silenced for good.

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Reviewer: Theresa Goldrick

What do you get when you mix a woman who has ensconced herself in her home out of fear and loss, a police officer who is suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome, and a killer with his heart set on revenge? 

Their adventure together starts when Officer Dany Howard, while on stress leave, is sorting through the attic at his grandmother’s house and he comes upon a bottle with a message in it that he had found washed ashore on the beach of the Bay of Fundy twenty years earlier.  Dany decides to find the person who wrote the message in the bottle.

Who he finds is a woman who was the target of a shooting that killed her brother.  As soon as Dany and Julia meet they realize that it isn’t by coincident that they are together but God’s way of bringing healing to both of them as they look for the killer.  And once they find him, will Julia have the strength to forgive him?

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading a good romantic mystery centered around living a life for Christ.  I feel that the author was really able to impact the reader with the emotions a person feels when they live with varying aspects of depression and how God is definitely a part of the healing process.

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Reviewer: Mary Hosmar

Daniel Howard and Julia McIntyre are both suffering what could very well be the end of their respective careers. Daniel, a policeman in Halifax, Nova Scotia, is haunted by the shooting and killing of a young boy at his hands. Julia, a singer from London, Ontario, saw her brother shot while trying to protect her from a mad stalker. A long forgotten message brings the two together.

What happens after that makes for an exciting tale – murder, intrigue, betrayal and romance – it’s all there. As Daniel sets out to help the London police find Julia’s stalker, both his faith in God and Julia’s faith are put to the test.

What should be an exciting tale tends to get bogged down at times in unnecessary details and redundancy. The author seems to want to make sure we get a point by repeating it several times in various ways. Much of the story is taken up by internal thoughts, telling rather than showing, thus interrupting the action.

The author’s faith comes through the story very clearly. And while what the characters say is true, the timing of these discourses is not always credible. For example, I find it difficult to believe a man bent on murdering his victim and knowing time is running out for him, would stop to listen for what had to be at least ten minutes, to a discourse on forgiveness. But then, that may just be my lack of experience with these situations.

In spite of these few shortcomings, this story itself is believable and interesting.

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