ramblingmads

A gruesome discovery in a Copenhagen apartment. A desperate author’s dark secret. A stalker who will stop at nothing, to destroy everything…Jensen returns in her most sinister case yet.

When human remains turn up behind an apartment wall DI Henrik Jungersen finds himself on the trail of a killer who has been hiding in plain sight.

Meanwhile, Jensen should be enjoying maternity leave but life has other plans. Legendary author, Valde Brix, is claiming to be her father. But Brix has an ulterior motive.

Then a woman connected to Brix turns up brutally murdered, and Jensen and her teenage apprentice Gustav become embroiled in Henrik’s investigation.

It soon becomes chillingly clear that the stalker will stop at nothing. And as the danger closes in Jensen realises the threat isn’t just to Brix – her own family is in mortal danger.

Heidi Amsinck a writer and journalist born in Copenhagen has lived in London for many years. A graduate of the MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck, University of London, she was previously shortlisted for the VS Pritchett Memorial Prize.  She has written many stories for BBC Radio 4 including The Bellevue Poltergeist series which features Jensen. She is the author of four previous books in the Jensen series: My Name is Jensen, The Girl in the Photo, Back from the Dead and Out of the Dark, as well a book of short stories, Last Train to Helsingor.

My thoughts: This was really good, a twisted, clever case that throws up lots of avenues for the detectives to go down, links between old cases and the new one, new cases coming along while they’re working that might be connected.

When the remains of a young woman are found bricked up in a Copenhagen flat, the police are shocked to discover that she was pregnant when she died. The flat’s owner insists he knows nothing, and suspicion falls on author Valde Brix, who once stayed there.

Brix has contacted Jensen, who’s on maternity leave, he drops a bombshell, he thinks he’s her father. He was in a relationship with her mother at around the right time, but Jensen’s mother is adamant he isn’t. He also asks Jensen to help him investigate a stalker who has been sending anonymous threats.

This brings Jensen back into Henrik’s life, while he’s already having problems at home, can they work together or is it just too complicated?

I really enjoy complex crime books like this, where the characters are as messy as real life and the cases cause them personal chaos. The case does get solved, but there are repercussions that might come up in future books.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

Meet Peter Maxwell: film buff, golden-hearted cynic, bow-tied eccentric teacher . . . and reluctant amateur sleuth.

When Peter Maxwell’s history club meeting sparks a deadly explosion,
leaving a charred body behind, the police suspect Maxwell was the intended target.

Then a hit-and-run attempt leaves Maxwell in no doubt. Someone wants
him dead — but why?

Now his neighbour, Mrs. B, is abducted — and Maxwell uncovers a chilling truth — someone is using his history lessons as a call to violence.

As the arsonist closes in on his next target, can Maxwell stop a deadly campaign of vengeance?

Or will history repeat itself once more…

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M J Trow (the ‘M’ as most people know by now stands for Meirion, a Welsh name few can manage, so he writes as M J, is known by all and sundry as Mei, rhyming with ‘my’) has been writing for many years, with his first book – The Adventures of Inspector Lestrade – being published in 1984 by Macmillan.

More Lestrades followed and then some true crime and somehow it all snowballed so now he has many historical biographies and three other crime series (Maxwell, Marlowe and Grand and Batchelor, the latter two written with his wife, writing as Maryanne Coleman, though her name is
Carol, actually!) to his credit.

He claims to be retired, but that’s just from teaching. In fact he has never been busier and is a sought after ‘ghost’ these days as well as historian and novelist, with many different subjects’ stories having been told
through him. He has recently started collaborating on fiction projects (with
someone other than his wife, that is) and finds it a really exciting and pleasurable experience.To relax he … actually, that’s a bit tricky, as he doesn’t really ever relax.

He has been known to garden, he is a keen cook and artist and likes to travel. This is rather easier these days as he is a popular speaker on cruise ships – in fact his profile picture was taken on a very gusty day in
Cape Town, setting off on a long voyage home to Southampton through some of the scariest seas he and his wife have had the pleasure to meet!
It really was the calm before the storm, despite being a Force 9 just leaving the Bay.

My thoughts: Maxwell seems to have upset someone so badly this time they want him dead!

Forced by the terrifying headteacher of his son’s school into speaking at her history club, there then follows both several complaints about him, a house gets blown up (not his, but one mistaken for his), another gets set on fire and someone tries to run him over with a car.

The police can’t work out why a history teacher has provoked such rage and violence, but as there’s at least one dead body so far, they’d rather it stopped. Obviously Maxwell feels the same.

Luckily, with a bit of help from him, the police soon have it all sorted out, poison pen letters, and murderous history fan, but sadly not without another loss. And Mrs B getting kidnapped.

Bits of this book are laugh out loud funny, and I very much enjoy Maxwell’s conversations with the Count and the Chancellor (his cats) as well as the genuine love between the members of his family.

The resolution is a bit of a shock, as are the motivations behind it, and may even have Maxwell deciding against speaking at another history club meeting.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

Wiltshire is a county of ancient beauty — rolling chalk downs, wooded valleys and
chocolate-box villages. Famous for its ‘big’ skies and breathtaking scenery, it seems
tranquil. But looks can be deceiving.

Katarina Raslova, a young British archaeologist, is found dead in a secluded cabin on a powerful local landowner’s estate. Her body has been carefully posed.
She looks like an exquisite sculpture. Except for the bruises circling her neck.
The only potential witness is a terrified girl who waited at the scene for the police to arrive. . . then vanished without a trace.

Detective Craig Wild, formerly of the Metropolitan police, is called in to investigate. He quickly discovers there’s no shortage of suspects. An obsessive ex-boyfriend with no alibi. The landowner’s evasive son, who knows more than he’s telling. And someone on the estate is growing something far more deadly than wheat.

Even his own partner, Acting DC Marnie Olsen, has a troubling personal connection to the victim.

Wild is determined to crack the case — and quickly. But this is rural Wiltshire, not inner-city London. Here, everyone knows your business, and miles of countryside offer countless places to hide the truth.

And then another young woman’s body is discovered . . .

Derek Thompson grew up in London and credits the local library with fostering a
lifelong passion for books. As a teen he wrote dreadful poetry and the world’s densest fantasy novel. After a formative year in the US he returned with a lot of debt and a treasure trove of stories. In hindsight it seems like a fair trade.*

Fast-forward to 2008 when he wrote a feature for The Guardian and attended a novel-writing summer school, where the ideas for his debut spy thriller first emerged. He cites film noir as a major influence on his novels with recurring themes of death, truth and secrets. As the saying goes: write about what you know.
After five novels featuring Thomas Bladen, a working class spy in the UK’s Surveillance Support Unit, he began a separate crime mystery series that follows DS Craig Wild – a former Met detective now transferred to leafy Wiltshire.

Derek’s books have been described as snarky (it’s a real word), pared down, and
morally ambiguous. What more could any novelist ask for? Apart from pens — you
can never have too many pens.

*Especially if he can sell the film script.

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My thoughts: It starts with the body of an archaeologist, it ends with a suspect no one had on their list. As the police hunt for a killer, they have plenty of suspects but not the right one as more bodies prove. Who is responsible and why?

The possibility of a Saxon hoard is exciting, but someone has a different plan to hunting for ancient treasures. DS Wild and his colleagues are soon chasing clues all over Wiltshire and beyond. And then there’s their private issues too – Wild gets close to a woman of the cloth, is Marnie jealous or just distracted?

There’s some career rivalry that needs to be resolved, as well as whether Wild is going to be sticking around, but when it becomes clear the answers they’re looking for are a bit more complicated, it’s Wild that might just be able to get to the truth…

Full of twists, cleverly plotted and with engaging characters, this series is fun and interesting, sleepy Wiltshire is a lot more interesting than you might expect…

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.