Hear No Evil: Shortlisted for the CWA Historical Dagger 2023

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If found guilty she faces one of two fates; death by hanging or incarceration in an asylum. But Jean's deafness leaves her isolated and unable to defend herself, until the authorities call in Robert Kinniburgh, a talented teacher from the Deaf & Dumb Institution. The book also indulges in what, for me, is the least appealing characteristic of historic fiction. The narrative voice dips in and out of the time period of the book, it’s not quite as antiquated as an actual book from the early 1800s but, for a lot of the book, it resides in a sort of vaguely 19th century tone, matching how the characters talk. The focus of the narration is however firmly in the 21st century, the emphasis is all on what a modern reader would notice most if transplanted to this time, the contrasts between now and 1817. Good people are those with attitudes most closely mirroring modern attitudes, bad people are more of their time, the world building is firmly focused on the parts of the cities modern audiences would recognise and be interested in and, when it becomes inconvenient, the narrative voice will waver or switch to more easily convey something. Imagine standing trial and facing the death penalty for something that only you know the truth of. Imagine being unable to hear what is being said around you as men stand in court and decide your fate. Imagine being unable to stand up for yourself and to rely on a complete stranger to communicate on your behalf.. and trust that he has your best interests at heart. Now add in a time when women were seen as a lower class citizen, a commodity for men to enjoy and possess. A time when even women who could speak, hear and communicate freely we’re not allowed to have a voice. As much as I make an effort to read diverse books, I can’t remember ever reading a book with a deaf protagonist. That is the main reason I requested Hear No Evil. It actually isn’t set in a period I’m particularly fond of reading about, but it had enough subject matter to hook me.

The writing is so amazing for a debut novel! We have Jean, deaf and unable to tell her story. Therefore, we never receive her POV. Instead we develope events of the plot by the POV of the characters Jean encounters, as well as the POV of Robert as he interprets her story and investigates what led to the events of 24th February 1817 and Jean's arrest. While this made it a compelling read, I do feel that this somewhat took the emotion out of Jean's story, and I was unable to connect to her character as much as I hoped to. Beyond that there were a lot of issues for me as well though. The pacing was wildly inconsistent, there seemed to be no reason for Jean to draw out the telling of her story for so long. She was facing the gallows, there’s no point in being reluctant to tell Robert anything and his first few meetings with her seemed cut short for no reason other than artificially drawing out the plot.Sibbald, a gruff, heavyset man, said little as he led Robert up a narrow central staircase to a landing that fanned out in a circle and was punctuated by dark wooden doors. Each of these doors was furnished with a slit at eye level. Robert noticed that the keeper passed them without bothering to look inside. Whether Sibbald was supremely confident about the state of the people in the cells or whether there were currently no other inhabitants apart from the newly arrived Glaswegian murderess, Robert couldn’t tell. The story unfolds at a fairly slow pace as we slowly learn more and more about Jean’s life, often through her recounting her story and Robert travelling to meet people she shared her life with, sometimes through swapping to the perspectives of the people involved in Jean’s story or Jean herself. I don’t really want to get into the details of the story at this stage as I actually think it’s best enjoyed going into it blind and spoiler-free – which is why I also made sure not to google Jean Campbell until I had finished the book. The author has taken the scant details of the case and created an immersive tale. Despite the book being based on Jean’s story Robert Kinniburgh vies for the central character spot. Kinniburgh, a teacher at the deaf school is called in to communicate with Jean when she is imprisoned in Edinburgh's tolbooth.

Based on a case from Scottish legal history, Smith’s novel s kilfully combines crime fiction with a woman’s struggle to speak the truth’ The Times There are different forms of justice meted out to various characters and this raises some interesting questions about punishment, revenge and rehabilitation. If found guilty she faces one of two fates; death by hanging or incarceration in an asylum. But Jean’s deafness leaves her isolated and unable to defend herself, until the authorities call in Robert Kinniburgh, a talented teacher from the Deaf & Dumb Institution.Glasgow, 1817: Jean Campbell – a young, Deaf woman – is witnessed throwing a child into the River Clyde from the Old Bridge. A fascinating exploration of deafness and human value amid the sights, sounds and smells of urban Scotland in 1817.'- Sally Magnusson A fascinating exploration of deafness and human value amid the sights, sounds and smells of urban Scotland in 1817. * Sally Magnusson *

In between these meetings we have Robert’s trips to Glasgow which take a large chunk of the book while achieving little. Long chunks are devoted to his search for Donnelly who he never meets, rendering those parts rather pointless, seemingly only included to allow lengthy descriptions of Glasgow in 1817. We are delighted to announce the shortlist for the Scottish Crime Debut of the Year 2022. With thanks to The Glencairn Glass for their support of this year’s prizes. She is take to Edinburgh and help is sought in the form of Robert Kinniburgh, a teach from the Deaf Institute. It's his responsibility to establish communication with Jean, decide whether she is fit for trial and try and get to the bottom of what happened. Hear No Evil' is based on the true story of Jean Campbell, a deaf woman accused of throwing her baby in the river in 1817. The first character we meet is Robert Kinniburgh, a teacher from the Deaf and Dumb institute, who has been called in to try and establish what happened. Taken from her home of Glasgow to the cells in Edinburgh, it isn't clear at first if Jean even knows what she's been accused of. If found guilty, Jean faces two equally terrible punishments; death by hanging, or commitment to an asylum. But there is more to her story and situation than Kinniburgh had expected. Moving uneasily from interpreter to investigator, Jean's case starts to swallow his own life; and it will take a whole community to help Jean's story be heard.What happens when a person who is deaf and without speech, is accused of murder? What if this happens not in our time, or even in Helen Keller’s time, but 200 years ago - before sign language was standardised (sort of), and when deaf persons were often assumed to be unintelligent? Besides writing a good story, Smith is also a delightful wordsmith. Just listen to this description: "Every bit of sinew and muscle in operation, the slight flap of aged skin escaping from her tightly rolled sleeves." The story was borne out of frustration, really. I began looking at the court records and there was very little about Jean herself. She was an important figure in Deaf history because she was tried on the same basis as a hearing person. In the absence of facts, I decided to fictionalise the reasons for Jean’s crime; what had led her and her child to be on that bridge in the first place? I hoped my fictional Jean could give the real Jean a voice that was denied her at the time. The novel does follow the trial of Jean Campbell but this is more the story of her interpreter Richard Kinniburgh. Now his story is very interesting but I wish I could have read more about Jean Camptell herself. Her story gets a little lost at times but Richard’s is so very compelling! Speaking of realism, I used my iPad’s dictionary function so much while reading Hear No Evil - Scottish dialect of the 19th century was odd.

The novel centres around the potential injustice faced by a poor deaf woman and the man who supports her in the fight against that. To have two such sympathetic characters as Jean Campbell and Robert Kinniburgh at its heart and for there to be such a tense edge to the story all the way through is a real achievement. Smith uses a roving perspective and this is handled effectively, her shifts in register and tone consistently applied. This aspect of the writing gives room for many of the other characters to emerge strongly and helps give the novel a strong and realistic texture. Alongside that, there are wonderful sensory descriptions of life at that time in urban Scotland - I can still smell the streets! Hear No Evil is historical fiction loosely based on the true story of Jean Campbell, a deaf woman in 1817 arrested for being seen allegedly throwing her child into the river Clyde, the book follows the court case, Jean’s interactions with her interpreter Richard Kinniburgh and navigates through a world of deafness.

Interpreter required

The Bloody Scotland Prize for Scottish Crime Writing first awarded in 2012 was renamed The McIlvanney Prize in 2016. The Bloody Scotland Debut Prize was introduced in 2019 and won by Claire Askew who this year made the McIlvanney longlist along with Deborah Masson who won the Debut Prize in 2020. The historical setting of Edinburgh and Glasgow are rendered well and give an insight into the developments of the cities and how they would have looked in the 1800s. I sometimes struggle a little with historical fiction which is often so riveting, well written and interesting but so many aspects are made up and I end up struggling to separate fact from fiction. As a result, I don’t really read this genre often. However, I saw this and had to read it when I realised it focuses on a deaf character and features BSL (I’m deaf but not native signer, although I started learning BSL later in life). There are aspects to this book that I really enjoyed. The author’s interest seems to be deaf communication and education and the sections delving into that were by far the strongest. The scene in the deaf church explaining the manner in which the service was conducted and the town hall meeting in which Robert describes the nascent BSL he uses and how he teaches his pupils at the deaf school were both excellent scenes.