She Treads Softly: The Burial Place

Wednesday, August 20, 2025

The Burial Place

The Burial Place by Stig Abell
8/26/25; 368 pages
HarperCollins
Jake Jackson #3

The Burial Place by Stig Abell is a recommended mystery and the third novel in the Jake Jackson series.

Jake Jackson is a former London detective who now lives a bucolic life in the country at Little Sky and is in a relationship with local vet, Livia. When a group of archaeologists at a nearby dig site uncover the remains of a Roman settlement, members of the team begin to receive threatening letters signed Wulfnoth. The early letters were ignored, but then they became increasingly threatening. After a team member is killed, Jake offers his assistance to the new Chief Inspector David McAllister to find the killer.

While the quality of the writing is very good, it is almost overly descriptive and focuses way too much on Jake's personal life rather than the mystery. This slows the plot to a crawl and it was a struggle to hold my interest. Personally, I'm reading for the mystery, so I ended up skimming through Jake's personal shenanigans to focus on following the mystery and figuring out whodunit. Admittedly, I have not read the previous two novels in the series so this is my first introduction to Jake. For those who enjoy classical music, Abell provides a glossary of selections he listened to while writing at the end of the novel.

The Burial Place will be most appreciated by those who have read the previous books in the series. Thanks to HarperCollins for providing me with an advance reader's copy via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and expresses my honest opinion.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.