Bromgrove folk are dying to join Fitness for All. A friendly little gym where everyone’s welcome. And everyone’s a suspect.
Paralympian Jack Donahue has always been the gym’s devastatingly handsome poster boy. Until now.
Jack is found dead in the weights room. Bludgeoned with the same dumbbell that helped sculpt his world-class biceps!
Detective Gil Markham is called to investigate, with his loyal — and gloriously tactless — sidekick George Noakes never far behind.
But the deeper they dig into Jack’s secrets, the more suspects they find.
Behind his spotless public image, Jack wasn’t short of enemies. A spurned student with a grudge. A bitter ex-trainer. A girlfriend hiding secrets of her own.
Markham fears it all links back to a spate of attacks on the ladies of the Silver Swans barre group.
Before long, a second body falls. Then a third . . . both paid-up members of the gym.
Whoever’s behind these killings, they’re only just getting warmed up. Can Markham solve the case before they return to make it a personal best?
A wonderfully witty and twist-packed British crime mystery you won’t be able to put down. Perfect for fans of Elly Griffiths, Faith Martin, Clare Chase, P.F. Ford and LJ
Ross.
Catherine Moloney is a Liverpool writer of Irish-American heritage. After graduating
in Jurisprudence from Jesus College (University of Oxford), she was called to the Bar at Gray’s Inn. Despite qualifying as a barrister, her first love was English; this led to a PhD in English Literature at Birkbeck College (University of London).
In her academic career, she lectured and published widely on the subject of
tuberculosis and nineteenth-century literature, but somehow managed to avoid
contracting galloping hypochondria and turned her attention to crime fiction.
My thoughts: The Fitness For All gym is the centre of the crimes in this book – Paralympian Jack Donahue is murdered in the weight room, and several members of the Silver Swans dance class have been attacked around town. The only thing that connects the victims is the gym. But are the crimes being committed by the same person and why?
As Markham and his team investigate, they find Donahue wasn’t the golden boy he appeared to be and there were plenty of people who disliked him – but did that lead to his death?
There’s some people at the university too, where Donahue was supposed to be doing a PhD, some of whom seem very keen on him and others, like his girlfriend’s ex, who really don’t. That ex, a rather strange guy anyway – obsessed with eugenics and claiming Donahue was abusive, certainly seems to have motive.
But while he might have plenty to say, does he really seem like a killer? When another body is found, it seems less likely. Can the team crack the case?
Clever, funny (Noakes is rather entertaining if a bit of a dinosaur) and with a twisted killer at the centre, this is another excellent case for the Bromgrove CID.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 