Hear No Evil: Shortlisted for the CWA Historical Dagger 2023

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A striking and stylish literary page-turner that breathes life into the past, illuminating a fascinating corner of history by revealing its lost voices and contemporary resonance.

It was a cold February and the thick stone walls of the building were damp with rain, yet Robert found that he was sweating under his woollen coat. Scottish Spoken Word Showcase Spoken word is an increasingly visible and important part of Scotland’s cultural life.The importance of sign language is clear as a bridge not just between people who are deaf but also to those who can hear. The former Labour Home Secretary has written a series of witty memoirs, and he’s regularly regaled Book Festival audiences with colourful tales of life beyond Westminster. A captivating novel about the plight of the hearing-impaired in Regency Scotland with a dash of murder mystery thrown into the middle.

It takes the bare bones of what is known about the real life 19th century case of a young deaf women, Jean Campbell, who was accused of the murder of her child and knits them together into an engrossing story. In Sarah Smith's debut, Hear No Evil, Robert Kinniburgh, a teacher at Edinburgh's Deaf and Dumb Institution, is summoned to one of the city's jails, where an unusual prisoner awaits interrogation.The prose is measured and a little underwhelming at times, although I did enjoy the Victorian-style short chapters and character descriptions. At one point there is even a conversation about translating vs interpreting Jean in Court and how it would be possible to deny her truth and reword it for the sake of the jury, again this highlighted how even those sympathetic to disability hold the power. 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.

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. A figure from the past is given a voice and their story fictionalized in novel form with many true life threads woven through. I found the process of development, and standardisation, of sign language extremely interesting, as well as the links between signing and etymology.Based on a landmark case in Scottish legal history Hear No Evil is a richly atmospheric exploration of nineteenth-century Edinburgh and Glasgow at a time when progress was only on the horizon. I found the subject matter explored interesting and Smith really took the time to examine the details.