Tag: crime fiction

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Breakthrough – Judy Kroll

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Is Blood really Thicker than Water?

Something is terribly wrong at Angiras, a family-owned medical start-up. Neddy Emory and her brother Charles are about launch a revolutionary life-saving therapeutic device. But they’ve hit a major snag. Critical research is unraveling and, to their shock and horror, one-by-one, team members are falling mysteriously ill.

Neddy and Charles race to move the project forward, while struggling to keep their employees safe. Failure is not an option. Without the device, their younger brother Daniel will die. But Neddy begins to suspect the company’s innovative research methods are being tampered with. When probed, Charles gaslights her. He refuses to slow down, claiming he is
Daniel’s only hope.

Torn between loyalty to her family and the welfare of the staff, Neddy desperately searches for the truth. Then the unspeakable happens. A fatality. Charles appears to finally be persuaded. But his next move shocks her, and she realizes: the danger is only beginning. And
she is on her own.

For fans of THE MAIDENS who will appreciate Neddy’s determination and perseverance as she fights to keep her family together despite fractured relationships, greed, and treachery.

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Judy Kroll worked for over twenty years in large and small corporations, including four years in the pharmaceutical industry, as a human resources professional and later as a career counselor. She provided job search assistance to hundreds of individuals, including physicians,
pharmacists, medical device developers, chemists, and other scientists impacted by mergers and downsizings. She is a practicing yogi (twenty-three years.)

Both corporate experiences as well as many years ‘on the mat’ inspired her book, Breakthrough. Specifically, in both of these
very disparate worlds, she observed the same phenomenon: the devastation wrought when a much-respected boss or mentor turns out to be unethical, and one must find a new path forward, seemingly alone.

She lives in northern New Jersey, and in addition to writing, gardening, and practicing yoga, Judy co-chairs a not-for-profit conservation organization.

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My thoughts: Neddy and her older brother Charles are developing a revolutionary medical device that might help younger brother Daniel, as well as millions of others, their company is due to complete a merger with another firm and raise some more capital, but then Neddy realises something very wrong is going on at the company.

As she investigates the strange things that have happened to their engineers, she risks destroying everything they’ve built, but is that a risk worth taking?

Clever, intriguing and compelling, this might be the author’s first book but I couldn’t tell, it’s such a well plotted and enjoyable read.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Other Mother – Heidi Field

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Suzannah is pregnant with her third child. The first is in prison. The second is dead. How far will she go to keep her unborn baby safe?

When Suzannah learns she is pregnant, she feels like safety and happiness are finally within reach.
Her handsome, successful fiancé, Alec, is over the moon about the baby. He proposes and pampers her. He thinks this is Suzannah’s first marriage and first child, but she’s keeping a few secrets.
Actually, a lot of secrets. And they are dangerous…putting Suzannah in a position where she must choose who and what she’s willing to sacrifice to keep her baby and her freedom.

Drowning in her lies, Suzannah is desperate to bury her past, but her ex-husband, who abandoned her years ago, returns, stalking her and demanding to know what really happened to their daughter.

When the imprisoned serial killer who lured and groomed her son, threatens to sell his story to the press, Suzannah feels like the life she’d built and the precious one she’s growing, teeter on a precipice. Now the two children she’s hidden from Alec may be the least of her worries.

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Heidi Field was raised in the beautiful countryside of the South of England with her parents and her two sisters. In her twenties she was a freelance Sports Massage Therapist. She achieved a Degree in Zoology at the age of thirty and then went on to raise two boys and became the stepmother of three more young children.

She still lives near her family home with her partner, their Great Dane and the
children that have yet to fly the nest. In her early forties Heidi completed a Masters in Creative Writing at Winchester University. She entered the course hoping she would become a children’s fantasy writer and left with a burning desire to write contemporary mysteries and thrillers. Heidi wanted to put relatable people in extraordinary situations, challenge them, push them to their limits
and watch them fight for their sanity.

The Other Mother is Heidi’s second novel, the next book in The Peasedale Woods Killers series.

FaceBook page: Heidi Field Author
Insta: Heidi.field.75 Tiktok: @fieldheidi11

My thoughts: Suzannah’s whole relationship with her fiancé is about to fall apart because of the many, many secrets she’s been keeping. She hasn’t told him about her previous marriage, her children,  their fathers, or where she goes every few weeks.

She’s hoping she won’t have to, until an unwelcome blast from the past forces her to. Now things are falling apart completely, because she just can’t seem to tell the whole truth, and Alec’s patience is getting short, he’s worried about her mental state and whether their baby’s safe.

Suzannah’s an unreliable narrator, even to herself she keeps up the pretence and doesn’t share the full truth.

There are plenty of shocking things that come out and more that happen as Suzannah scrambles to stop some of the secrets from spilling out and destroying her life.

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

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Blog Tour: The Secret Sauce – M.J. Porter

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The Secret Sauce, the third book in the Erdington Mysteries

Birmingham, England, November 1944.
Chief Inspector Mason of Erdington Police Station is summoned to a suspicious death at the BB Sauce factory in Aston on a wet Monday morning in late November 1944.

Greeted by his enthusiastic sergeant, O’Rourke, Sam Mason finds himself plunged into a challenging investigation to discover how Harry Armstrong met his death in a vat containing BB Sauce – a scene that threatens to put him off BB Sauce on his bacon sandwiches for the rest of his life.

Together with Sergeant O’Rourke, Mason follows a trail of seemingly unrelated events until something becomes very clear. The death of Harry Armstrong was certainly murder, and might well be connected to the tragedy unfolding at nearby RAF Fauld.

While the uncertainty of war continues, Mason and O’Rourke find themselves seeking answers from the War Office and the Admiralty, as they track down the person who murdered their victim in such an unlikely way.

Join Mason and O’Rourke for the third book in the quirky, historical mystery series, as they once more attempt to solve the impossible in 1940s Erdington.

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I’m an author of historical fiction and non-fiction (Early English (Saxon), Vikings and the British Isles as a whole before the Norman Conquest, as well as five twentieth-century mysteries), born in the old Mercian kingdom at some point since the end of 1066.

Historical mysteries allow me to use such modern inventions as the telephone and the car, which is very exciting when I spend so much of my time worrying about feeding the horses my warriors usually ride.

I was raised in the shadow of a strange little building and told from a very young age it housed the bones of long-dead kings of Mercia, it’s little wonder my curiosity in the early English ran riot. I can only blame my parents!
I like to write. You’ve been warned!

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A quick note for non-British readers; BB Sauce isn’t real but is inspired by HP Sauce, which is. As far as I know, no one has ever drowned in a vat of it. Sometimes referred to as brown sauce (as opposed to tomato ketchup aka red sauce), some people enjoy it on their bacon sandwiches, chips and other savoury dishes. I am not a fan.

My thoughts: A rather strange death, a man drowned in a vat in a sauce factory near Birmingham. He was the delivery driver for the factory and shouldn’t have been inside after they closed half day on Saturday, so why was he there and who killed him?

There don’t appear to be many clues, most of the workers had been heading off to the football after finishing up for the weekend. The few clerical staff had gone too, and the owner had locked up. There was no reason for Harry to even be inside that part of the factory, as the driver he only needed access to the yard and loading dock.

The police are stumped. But as they investigate the BB Sauce factory, its staff and Harry’s own history, it becomes clear that plenty of people have something to hide. There are secrets galore. 

There’s also a terrible explosion at the nearest RAF base, and as the case goes on, there’s a worry that it might be connected. Could someone working at the factory in fact be some sort of enemy agent? With the war still raging on, people are supposed to be on the lookout for anyone suspicious, and several of the employees certainly are. 

In the end this is a much more complex case than the accident it has been made to look like, Harry didn’t put himself in the vat, he certainly didn’t trip and fall from the gangway above, and the stench of vinegar is overwhelming. A bit like guilt.

Clever, complex and occasionally quite funny, this was a very enjoyable outing for Mason and the excellent O’Rourke (who will probably end up running the place one day!)

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

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Blog Tour: Shocking Crimes – Michael Hambling

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A body in a suitcase. A woman in a coma. A cold case that’s suddenly red-hot.

When a child’s mummified body is discovered in a suitcase hidden in the loft of a rundown terraced house in Bournemouth, even Sophie Allen and her hardened team of detectives are
shocked to their core.
The only clue to the victim’s identity is a badly-spelt note: Im Jan. im only 10. plees help me.

Meanwhile, a young woman lies in a coma in the local hospital. Student Holly Evans was jabbed in the thigh with a potentially lethal drug while out clubbing with friends. Was Holly simply in the wrong place at the wrong time — or was she deliberately targeted?

When Sophie’s team uncovers a link between Holly and the body in the suitcase, the case takes a shocking twist.
Twenty years ago something very nasty happened inside 68 Crawley Terrace — and someone is prepared to go to any lengths to ensure the truth remains hidden.

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I try to write thoughtful, contemporary crime novels and include several plot layers in my books. The adult novels feature DCI Sophie Allen and her close-knit team of detectives. I don’t write simple whodunnits, nor violent, all-action, gun-toting thrillers.

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My thoughts: This was an excellent addition to this series of crime novels featuring Sophie Allen and her team.

The body of a young child has been found in a suitcase, wedged inside a hidden alcove in the attic of a house. The house belongs to a woman in prison for murder, but before that it belonged to her uncle. She knows something about it, but won’t disclose anything unless the police give her something in return to help with her case.

Meanwhile a student at the University has been ‘spiked’ while out with friends, jabbed in the leg with something in a club. She has a heart condition and is now in a coma. Wrong place, wrong time? It appears so at first, but once they gather more information, something more sinister appears to have been going on.

Could these cases, despite the twenty odd years between them, be connected?

Clever, full of twists and with a team of dedicated detectives on the case, along with some rather suspicious types, who know more than they’re saying, this is the kind of case that will keep you guessing!

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Death of a Stranger – John Pilkington

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1594, Bishopsgate Ward, London. Within the walls and without, unease and uncertainty lurk beneath the noise and bustle of a smoky, teeming city.

Matthew Cutler, newly widowed and caring for two spirited daughters, takes his position as constable for the parish of Spitalfields very seriously. So when Paulo Brisco, a quiet Venetian perfumer is found brutally murdered in his own shop, Cutler throws himself into his first major crime, and one which threatens to set all Bishopsgate alight. 🔥

Being a humble parish constable, Matthew Cutler’s powers are slight – and yet he possesses a skill which most others do not. As a former actor, he can employ disguise, to considerable effect and to his
unique advantage…

Plunged into a treacherous world of notorious rakes, angry tradesmen and a community seething with anti-foreigner sentiment and suspicion, Cutler must decipher shattered clues and confront a
killer whose motive remains a baffling mystery – until the very last.

Step into the dangerous world of Elizabethan London with this cracking murder mystery!🩸🔍

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A writer for over forty years, John Pilkington was born in Lancashire and worked at many jobs including laboratory assistant, farm worker, weaver, shipping clerk, picture frame-maker and cabaret
musician before taking a degree in Drama and English and finding his true vocation.

He has since written plays for radio and theatre, television scripts for a BBC soap, a short-lived children’s series and numerous works of historical fiction, concentrating now on the Tudor and Stuart eras. He also
ventured into speculative fiction with his biography of Shakespeare’s famous jester, Yorick.

He now lives in a village on a tidal estuary in Devon with his long-term partner Elisabeth; they have a son who is a psychologist and musician. When not at the desk he walks, swims, listens to music, and tinkers with DIY. projects, and is enjoying being a grandfather.

Bookbub profile: @jpscript

My thoughts: Elizabethan London was full of danger, although murder was rarely one of them, you were far more likely to fall into the Thames or die of plague. However, it’s murder that concerns Matthew Cutler, constable of Bishopsgate in the City of London. A perfumier, an Italian (people from other countries were known as strangers, hence the title) has been killed in his shop.

While Matthew’s powers are limited, it is up to him to find the killer. No proper police force exists, and there’s an obvious political angle as the victim was not only foreign, but Catholic, religion being the current main issue in England. Could one of his customers have killed him? He certainly seems to have popular.

As Matthew and his friend Margaret investigate, Matthew uses his player’s skills to gain access to some of Brisco’s higher-class clients and discovers that far from merely supplying scent, the Italian was also involved with some of the ladies he sold to. Perhaps an angry husband might be the killer. Until they discover that the pillow talk Brisco engaged in could have compromised England’s defences.

There’s a lot of intrigue and the more Matthew investigates the more suspects he finds, Brisco was clearly more than just a good salesman and the suspicion of strangers that Matthew has tried to avoid, may in this case, be justified. Can he find a way through the many strands of Brisco’s life and actually find a killer or will the threats to his family make him stop?

Full of historical details brought vividly to life, thankfully without the odours of 16th Century London, this is a clever, engaging read with a really interesting plot and characters.

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

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Blog Tour: Broken Bones – John Carson

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Some bodies just won’t stay buried…

After putting a stop to one of Edinburgh’s most notorious serial killers 3 years ago, DCI Liam Brodie is known as a man who can handle – and solve – the hardest of cases. But when he’s assigned to Fife’s
Major Investigations Team, he soon realises that he’s walking into a minefield. The previous DCI is missing, presumed dead, and the case he’s been called in to lead becomes dangerously close to
home.

When a child’s bones are unearthed beneath the floorboards of an old house in Fife – the same house where his girlfriend, psychologist Ruth Calder, grew up as a foster daughter – Brodie uncovers a
tangled web of lies and jealousy. Ruth’s foster mother, now gripped by dementia, holds fragments of the truth but in a community haunted by its history, Brodie must navigate betrayal and buried guilt to
bring a decades-old secret to light.
But at what cost to those he loves most? ⚠️

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John Carson is the multi-million, bestselling author of numerous Scottish-set crime series.

Facebook: @john.carsonauthor
Instagram: @johncarsonauthor

My thoughts: Brodie has been working on a case involving a now imprisoned serial killer, trying to locate and identify his victims. Seconded to Fife, where their DCI has gone missing and key people connected to him have died in supposed suicides, he’s involved in two very different cases.

The first is the terribly sad case of the remains of a young boy found under the floorboards of a house. He might be the son of the owner – a child who supposedly ran away after his father committed suicide. If that’s true, someone in the house killed him and hid his body. To complicate matters, Brodie’s partner Ruth, was fostered by the family as a child. She remembers the house and the family as not a happy place or people. Brodie’s got to find out what happened, and it stirs up difficult memories for all involved.

The MIT officers are also looking for their boss, after returning from holiday, he just vanished. It distracts them from the murdered boy, and Brodie, while sympathetic, has to pull them up on it and get them back to work.

Meanwhile his Edinburgh colleagues are attempting to identify the body found in a shallow grave, one their serial killer didn’t put there. It turns out to be connected to Brodie too, and there might be another serial killer out there.

This is a gripping, clever read, there are twists and turns and the three cases overlap and interweave as the two police teams attempt to solve them. Brodie is torn between the work he’s doing in Fife and what’s happening in Edinburgh, wanting to help there too. As for the missing DCI, it doesn’t look good for him either.  I really enjoyed this and if you’re into thrillers or police procedurals, you will too.

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

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Blog Tour: Scars of Silence – Johana Gustawsson, translated by David Warriner

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Twenty-three years ago, a young woman was murdered on the Swedish island of Lidingö.

The island has kept its silence.

Until now…

As autumn deepens into darkness in Lidingö, on the Stockholm archipelago, the island is plunged into chaos: in the space of a week, two teenaged boys are murdered. Their bodies are left deep in the forest, dressed in white tunics with crowns of candles on their heads, like offerings to Saint Lucia.

Maïa Rehn has fled Paris for Lidingö after a family tragedy. But when the murders shake the island community, the former police commissioner is drawn into the heart of the investigation, joining Commissioner Aleksander Storm to unravel a mystery as chilling as the Nordic winter.

As they dig deeper, it becomes clear that a wind of vengeance is blowing through the archipelago, unearthing secrets that are as scandalous as they are inhuman.

But what if the victims weren’t who they seemed? What if those long silenced have finally found a way to strike back?

How far would they go to make their tormentors pay?

And you – how far would you go?

Born in Marseille, France, and with a degree in Political Science, Johana Gustawsson has worked as a journalist for the French and Spanish press and Her critically acclaimed Roy & Castells series, including Block 46, Keeper and Blood Song, has won the Plume d’Argent, Balai de la découverte, Balai d’Or and Prix Marseillais du Polar awards, and is now published in nineteen countries. A TV adaptation is currently under way in a French, Swedish and UK co-production. The Bleeding was a number-one bestseller in France and is the first in a new series. Johana lives in Sweden with her Swedish husband and their three sons.

My thoughts: This was so good, shocking and horrible, and totally gripping. There’s something very haunting, and deeply twisted, about dressing the victims as Saint Lucia, in her white dress and crown of light. But the killer is making a statement. It just takes a while for Commissioner Aleks Storm to join the pieces and work out the connection between the victims. 

Aided by French detective Maïa Rehn, asked by the grandmother of the convicted killer from twenty-three years ago to take another look at that case, Storm must find the person who has decided to take terrible revenge on those who have gone unpunished. They have bided their time and held onto their grief for so long. The deaths and what they represent will tear the community apart and destroy lives.

Dark, haunted by the past, and full of righteous anger at the slow change of the law (which is the same everywhere, society fast outpaces the justice system), this is another absolutely brilliant read from Johana Gustawsson, an incredibly skilled writer, who draws you into her world and never really let’s you go.

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

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Blog Tour: Before Her Eyes – Jack Jordan

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She can’t see the killer but the killer can see her.

Naomi Hannah has been blind since birth. Struggling with living in a small, claustrophobic town, Naomi contemplates ending her life. But then she stumbles across the body of a young woman who has been brutally murdered. She senses someone else there at the scene – watching her. Naomi may not be able to see the killer’s face, but she is still the only person who can identify him.

As the police begin hunting the person responsible and more victims are discovered, Naomi is forced to answer the question on which her fate hangs: why did the killer let her live?

In a town this small, the murderer must be close, perhaps even before her very eyes…

My thoughts: Naomi is a deeply unhappy person, struggling with depression following the end of her marriage, having trouble talking to her family, she’s contemplated ending it all a few times.

Making her way home from work one evening, she takes a wrong turn and ends up in an alley. In the alley is a dead woman and her killer. Naomi can’t see the person standing right in front of her, and the killer uses that.

A series of truly terrible things happen to Naomi, who has the very serious misfortune of getting onto the radar of two different psychopaths. As her life is endangered, can the police solve the murders and keep Naomi alive?

Twisted, shocking and violent, the small town Naomi has lived in her whole life is rocked by the events, could it all be connected to the disappearance of a teenage girl years before, and if so, why does someone want to torment the blind woman?

The story of course has a signature Jack Jordan end twist, that is so well hidden, you won’t have any idea what’s coming, poor Naomi.

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

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Blog Tour: Angel Takes Off – Roger Silverwood

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Detective Inspector Michael Angel returns to face his toughest case yet — and this time, he’s missing his right-hand man!

Discover a brand-new, page-turning murder mystery in the bestselling series. One million books read!

A detective who’s no angel despite his name . . .

Meet Detective Michael Angel. An old-school policeman who sometimes rubs his team up the wrong way. He’s got his flaws, but he never gives up on a case.

One dead actor, murdered on set while the cameras roll.
When dashing Rodney Pertwee is shot dead at Northern Film Studios, everyone assumes it’s part of the script. Until Rodney’s leading lady spots a bloodstain that’s anything but fake.

Enter Inspector Angel. He arrives to find a room full of shaken witnesses. They all watched Rodney die. Yet no one saw the real-life shooter.
Who’s telling the truth — and who’s turning in an award-winning performance?

Out of the corner of his eye, Angel glimpses a mysterious woman in green, slipping out the exit. No one knows her name. Or what she was doing on the closed set.

Angel’s determined to find out. But he can’t do it without his loyal DC Scrivens — who’s
disappeared without a trace.

Can Angel track down his friend before the killer returns for one final cut?

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Roger Silverwood is a mystery crime writer who lives in Barnsley in Yorkshire at the foot of the Pennines. He has worked as a salesman and sales manager covering the UK and Ireland.

He has been a copywriter in an advertising agency and an antique dealer in precious jewellery until he retired in 1989 to write full-time.

His big success is the series of 29 books featuring Inspector Angel. He has also written 5 standalone novels and a radio play. His books are available in all English-speaking countries.

Website

My thoughts: This was really good, there was so much mystery around the identity and whereabouts of the probable murderer. This figure that was just out of Inspector Angel’s reach multiple times – he got so close.

But even before we got onto the murder, Angel had to rescue his number two, DC Scrivens, who had been abducted by the gang he brought down by arresting their leader.

Two investigations for the price of one!

This was hugely enjoyable and now I have the immense fun of exploring the rest of the series. Join me!

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

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Blog Tour: Eleven Hours to Murder – D.B. Borton

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A cold case from the Swinging Sixties.

A sassy senior sleuth.

If Cat Caliban’s not your favorite crime-solving grandma, you just haven’t met her yet.

Meet Cat Caliban: former housewife, widow, cat lady — and private eye in training. Who said fifty-something was too old to start again?

But if Cat’s not old, the case that lands on her desk sure is. Back in the summer of ’69, rebellious teen Leila Perle secretly boarded a bus to Woodstock, and never came home.
What really happened at the legendary music festival — if the missing girl even made it there at all?

Some say that if you can remember the Sixties, you weren’t there. But Cat’s certain someone from the hazy, drug-addled era of peace, love and rock ‘n’ roll remembers exactly what happened to the missing music-lover.
And they’ll do anything to keep their terrible secret buried.

ELEVEN HOURS TO MURDER — a whip-smart, witty mystery featuring Cincinnati’s sharpest-tongued sleuth, three cats, one retired Black cop friend with a very unruly beagle, and a case where justice is long overdue.

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D. B. Borton is the author of two mystery series—the Cat Caliban series and the Gilda Liberty series —as well as the standalone mystery novels Smoke and Bayou City Burning and the humorous science fiction novel Second Coming.

In graduate school, Borton converted a lifetime of passionate reading and late-night movie-watching into a doctorate in English. She is Professor Emeritus of English at Ohio Wesleyan University.

Borton currently lives with Zoe the cat in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she gardens, practices aikido, a martial art, and, of course, reads.

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My thoughts: This is easily one of my absolute favourite crime series out there. I love Cat and her band of merry housemates, especially juvenile delinquent Sidney (he’s a cat) and of course Foggy, the voice of reason and experience, that Cat often ignores!

This case takes them back in time to 1969, when Cat was busy raising her children, and the summer of love was underway.

A teenage musician with dreams of making it big, Leila Perle disappeared, supposedly on the way to Woodstock. But as they investigate, Cat becomes certain she never left town.

This might be the saddest case Cat and co have investigated yet, there’s no joyful reunion or humour in what they discover. But it’s all done with such grace, the narrative really buoys you along.

Cat and a few other regular characters are such colourful, genuine people, you can’t help but love them. And it’s Valentine’s Day so Kevin has decorated the building in a way that’s guaranteed to annoy Foggy. And there’s Leon, who must be the hardest-working person ever. He’s on his 600th job here and still has time to help Cat out. It’s just the best.  

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