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:
A Maiden’s Grave, by Jeffery DeaverRead about another entry on the list.
Deaver has written one of the best portrayals of a Deaf community that I’ve read. A group of deaf students and their teachers are taken hostage by a trio of escaped convicts when their school bus stops at the scene of a car wreck. The novelfocuses on the negotiations between the FBI and the hostage takers, but the deaf characters, particularly the trainee teacher, Melanie, are integral to the plot. Not content to sit and wait to be rescued, Melanie takes things into her own hands, literally, as she sees the potential for the use of sign language to hatch a plot behind the kidnappers’ backs.
--Marshal Zeringue
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