At the heart of Gary McMahon's second outing to The Grove is the stinking underbelly of working class citizens etching out a living in the harsh and unforgiving landscape commonly known as The Concrete Grove. We meet again Simon Ridley, Brendan Cole and Marty Rivers who have never been able to escape an incident that occurred some 20 years ago and in this forced reunion they hope to do the business and rectify that which has gone before. What the author achieves here is creating a picture of the harsh realities and life style of those who have nothing and have no hope of ever having anything, and the premise that we are moulded by our childhood we can never escape from that and it makes us the person we have become today. Our 3 heroes have battled to achieve some meaning in their lives with limited success and as we learn they share a common bond of brutal upbringings....

"But it was too late for Marty to do anything but continue his assault. He kept punching, his fists aching, his fingers crunching, and could do nothing but wait until his terrible rage was spent. Anger drove him on, fueling his body and inuring it to the pain in his hands. He was once again the child whose father had beaten him for no other reason that to toughen him up, who grew into a teenager who burnt and lacerated his own body so that nobody would ever cause him pain or beat him in a stand-up fight."....and later "It's not so much that his father hits him, but more about the way the bastard treats Marty's mother. He knows that his father beats her at least once every two weeks - sometimes more often, if he's been drinking a lot. He rarely leaves marks, but there was that time last summer when they had to tell everyone that his mother had fallen down the stairs. She had two black eyes and her top lip was split and swollen. The skin around her jaw was red and tender to the touch."

"A hundred yards along Grove Crescent was the Arcade. The row of shops had always been here, ever since Simon could remember. The retail outlets renting the premises had changed, of course, but these were minor adaptions to the demands of the economy rather than any kind of improvement in consumer choice. The people round here did not want quality goods they wanted cheap and cheerful products that would do for the time being. These days, the shops were tenanted by a DVD rental outlet, a pizza and kebab takeaway service, Grove Grub (which was the only constant factor in the Arcade, having been there since Simon was a boy), a flower shop, a betting shop, a butchers-and-grocers, a small hardware store, a hairdressers with a solarium place in the flat above, and a grimy newsagent with faded advertisement for chocolate bars and comics in the chicken-wire-covered windows. More local kids in sports apparel hung around on the steps outside, mums stood smoking and chatting over prams, shady-looking men ducked in and out of the betting shop doorway, clutching or dropping onto the pavement creased slips of paper."

These are very powerful descriptive passages that add substance to "Silent Voices" and blend beautifully with the drabness and living hell of life in The Grove itself and the horror contained therein. The story leads us effortlessly through the present lives of Simon, Brendon, and Marty as they prepare to meet their nemesis for a final and frightening confrontation at the centre of The Grove.....The Needle..."The boys cross the road, walk along Grove Street and step into the Roundpath, the narrow walk-around circling the Needle. The large building hovers above them, as if cast adrift from its concrete foundations. It seems to totter and sway and as they approach the place they feel a sense of dislocation, as if they have ruptured something, broken through an invisible wall....."

I began to wonder could Gary McMahon maintain this frightening pace, this unputdownable read, until the end..... until the last page.....I need not have worried, in the hands of a professional author anything can happen and most surely will. All I will say is that the ending when it occurs is totally unexpected and clever in it's execution, leaving the way open nicely for the final installment of this wonderful trilogy. Highly Recommended. ( )