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S is for Silence is the Kinsey Millhone novel where Sue Grafton experiments with structure for the first time at scale, alternating present-day investigation chapters with extensive 1953 flashbacks that show what actually happened on the day Violet Sullivan disappeared. The choice works because Grafton commits to it; the period chapters are written with the same patient care as her contemporary procedural.
The case involves a Santa Maria Valley small town and a missing woman whose disappearance has been treated locally as her having run off. Kinsey is hired by the missing woman's adult daughter, who has come to believe her mother is buried somewhere in the valley.
The structural experiment paid off and Grafton uses it more confidently in the later books (U is for Undertow being the high point). S is for Silence is the first.
Four stars. Recommended even to readers who think they know what an alphabet novel can do.
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