blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Lesson – Lisa Bradley*

Read my review of Paper Dolls by the same author.

SOMEONE’S GOT TO MAKE HIM PAY.

Evie has just started her second year at University. She is young, beautiful and popular. She should be having the time of her life, except she has something to hide – a one-night-stand with her English Professor, Simon.

Not wanting any of his other students to be used in the same way, Evie reports their relationship to University HR. But hours later, Village Vixen, the student gossip blogger, is baying for blood. She’s found out about the accusation and is firmly on Simon’s side.

But how could Village Vixen possibly have known? Evie can’t help but feel like she’s being watched. As paranoia and fear set in, the one thing Evie knows for sure is someone has to teach Simon a lesson…

My thoughts: this was really good with twists and turns and jaw dropping moments of total “what just happened?” It’s so cleverly done, you can’t tell who you can trust, is Evie a liar, is Simon being set up, and what exactly is Jenny up to? None of them are reliable, all of them have an agenda.

I thoroughly enjoyed this, it was smart and gripping and I dropped my breakfast a few times when another sudden turn appeared. The ending especially is so shocking and unexpected. Brilliant stuff.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Therapist – Helene Flood*

From the mind of a psychologist comes a chilling domestic thriller that gets under your skin.

What happens when a psychologist begins to question her own sanity?

Sara runs a private psychology practice for troubled youth in the newly inherited house she is refurbishing with her husband, Sigurd. One morning, a voicemail from Sigurd tells Sara he’s arrived at a holiday cabin for a weekend away with the guys. A couple of hours later, Sigurd’s friends call from the cabin asking where he is — according to them, Sigurd never arrived.

Sara is irritated by what she thinks is a practical joke. But as the hours stretch out, her anger turns to fear, and the large empty house begins to feel increasingly threatening.

To get to the root of Sigurd’s disappearance, Sara must question everything she knows about their relationship. But can she trust her own thoughts? And where is she safe?

My thoughts: this took me a while to get into but when I did I found it really interesting. Sara starts her own investigation into her husband’s death, she also starts thinking about her own life – about her parents, her mother’s death and how she ended up where she is. As readers we spend a lot of time in Sara’s head, following her thoughts and sharing her moods.

It was an interesting and complex story – the police keep all their theories and suspects from her, so she builds her own, while being slowly terrorised in her own home. The final scenes are shocking and the answers it offers are a complete surprise.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: A Cut for a Cut – Carol Wyer*

Read my review of An Eye For An Eye

DI Kate Young can’t trust anybody. Not even herself.

In the bleak countryside around Blithfield Reservoir, a serial murderer and rapist is leaving a trail of bloodshed. His savage calling card: the word ‘MINE’ carved into each of his victims.

DI Kate Young struggles to get the case moving—even when one of the team’s own investigators is found dead in a dumpster. But Kate is battling her own demons. Obsessed with exposing Superintendent John Dickson and convinced there’s a conspiracy running deep in the force, she no longer knows who to trust. Kate’s crusade has already cost her dearly. What will she lose next?

When her stepsister spills a long-buried secret, Kate realises she’s found the missing link—now she must prove it before the killer strikes again. With enemies closing in on all sides, she’s prepared to do whatever it takes to bring them down. But time is running out, and Kate’s past has pushed her to the very edge. Can she stop herself from falling?

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USA Today bestselling author and winner of The People’s Book Prize Award, Carol Wyer writes feel-good comedies and gripping crime fiction. 

A move from humour to the ‘dark side’ in 2017, saw the introduction of popular DI Robyn Carter in LITTLE GIRL LOST and demonstrated that stand-up comedian Carol had found her true niche.

To date, her crime novels have sold over 750,000 copies and been translated for various overseas markets.

Carol has been interviewed on numerous radio shows discussing ”Irritable Male Syndrome’ and ‘Ageing Disgracefully’ and on BBC Breakfast television. She has had articles published in national magazines ‘Woman’s Weekly’, featured in ‘Take A Break’, ‘Choice’, ‘Yours’ and ‘Woman’s Own’ magazines and the Huffington Post.

She currently lives on a windy hill in rural Staffordshire with her husband Mr Grumpy… who is very, very grumpy.

When she is not plotting devious murders, she can be found performing her comedy routine, Smile While You Still Have Teeth.

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My thoughts: I really like this series, Kate feels understandable and realistic, I liked seeing her relationship with her stepsister Tilly, in this book, it made her less isolated and threw her troubles into a different light. She’s still searching for answers about her husband’s death but this new case leads her in different directions, looking for a serial rapist and killer – especially as one of his victims was a police officer.

The crimes are awful, obviously, and the evidence limited but Kate and her team are determined to find the killer. During the investigation she discovers a few new leads for her own case, and starts to gather the evidence she needs.

The writing is gripping and the plot zips along, there are a few false starts and its only when Tilly says something to Kate that it all starts to come together. The team work hard but the fact that the victims offer up little evidence doesn’t help. It was good to learn a bit more about the other officers too – I like Emma, the martial arts expert, who offers a calmer perspective than Kate’s. This series is shaping up to be really good and I’m looking forward to book three.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Rule – David Jackson*

Read my review of The Resident

MY DAD SAYS BAD THINGS
HAPPEN WHEN I BREAK IT…

Daniel is looking forward to his birthday. He wants fish and chips, a big chocolate cake, and a comic book starring his favourite superhero. And as long as he follows The Rule, nothing bad will happen. But Daniel has no idea that he’s about to kill a stranger.

Daniel’s parents know that their beloved and vulnerable son will be taken away. They know that Daniel didn’t mean to hurt anyone, he just doesn’t know his own strength. They dispose of the body. Isn’t that what any loving parent would do? But as forces on both sides of the law begin to close in on them, they realise they have no option but to finish what they started. Even if it means that others will have to die…

Because they’ll do anything to protect Daniel. Even murder.

David Jackson is the author of nine crime novels, including the bestseller Cry Baby and the standalone The Resident. When not murdering fictional people, David spends his days as a university academic in his home city of Liverpool. He lives on the Wirral with his wife and two daughters. Twitter

My thoughts: I wasn’t sure what to expect from the author of the creepiest book I read last year but it wasn’t this. A tale of ordinary people who get caught up in crime and chaos entirely by accident.

I completely understood Daniel, having grown up with and worked with people like him, with learning disabilities and who are childlike even as adults. I felt for his parents, who love him and just want to keep him safe. The nightmare the family become embroiled in is something you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy, no one deserves to be this frightened in their own home.

It was honestly an excellent book but a little heartbreaking too.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Lost Girls – Heather Young*

In 1935, six-year-old Emily Evans vanishes from her family’s vacation home on a remote Minnesota lake. Her disappearance destroys the family – her father commits suicide, and her mother and two older sisters spend the rest of their lives at the lake house, keeping a decades-long vigil for the lost child. Sixty years later, Lucy, the quiet and watchful middle sister, lives in the lake house alone. Before her death, she writes the story of that devastating summer in a notebook that she leaves, along with the house, to the only person who might care: her grandniece, Justine. For Justine, the lake house offers freedom and stability – a way to escape her manipulative boyfriend and give her daughters the home she never had. But the long Minnesota winter is just beginning. The house is cold and dilapidated. The dark, silent lake is isolated and eerie. Her only neighbor is a strange old man who seems to know more about the summer of 1935 than he’s telling. Soon Justine’s troubled oldest daughter becomes obsessed with Emily’s disappearance, her mother arrives to steal her inheritance, and the man she left launches a dangerous plan to get her back. In a house haunted by the sorrows of the women who came before her, Justine must overcome their tragic legacy if she hopes to save herself and her children.

HEATHER YOUNG is the author of two novels. Her debut, The Lost Girls, won the Strand Award for Best First Novel and was nominated for an Edgar Award. The Distant Dead has also been nominated for the 2021 Edgar Award for Best Novel. A former antitrust and intellectual property litigator, she traded the legal world for the literary one and earned her MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars in 2011. She lives in Mill Valley, California, where she writes, bikes, hikes, and reads books by other people that she wishes she’d written. Website Twitter

My thoughts: this was really enjoyable, combining a family murder mystery with later generations attempting to move on. Justine returns to her great-aunt’s house, left to her in the will, with her two daughters. She’s running from a life she no longer wants and hopes to begin again in this small town. But the town is full of people who know her family, and know about her missing great-aunt, who never got to grow up.

As she sorts through the remnants of her aunt’s life, and her mother comes to stay, she finds herself drawn into the mystery and secrets of the past.

Alternating between Justine’s present and Lucy’s past, slowly the truth is revealed. It’s very artfully done and very enjoyable too. I felt for Justine – sleepwalking through your own life is no fun, and I understood her worries. She was trying to do the best for her children but stuck due to things like money. Her mother was a bit of a nightmare and Justine’s determination to be different meant she couldn’t be happy.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Book Blitz: The Perfect Murder – Kat Martin

ThePerfectMurder

Congratulations to Kat Martin on the release of The Perfect Murder! A romantic suspense perfect for the beach or pool! Read on for details and a chance to win a $20 Amazon e-gift card and a digital copy of The Ultimate Betrayal!

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The Perfect Murder

Publication Date: Today 🎉

Publisher: HQN

New York Times bestselling author Kat Martin is back with her most thrilling novel yet in the Maximum Security series—The Perfect Murder.

The eldest of the three wealthy Garrett brothers, Reese Garrett is in the middle of a major purchase for his multimillion-dollar oil and gas company, Garrett Resources. The Poseidon offshore drilling platform venture will greatly enhance the company’s value.

But when Reese is on a trip out to see the rig, his helicopter crashes, leaving him hospitalized and two men dead. It’s discovered the chopper was sabotaged, and Reese is determined to find out who’s behind the crash—and whether he was the intended target. Then, when his lover, Kenzie, is accused of her ex-husband’s murder—a man with a vested interest in the Poseidon deal—clues start pointing to a connection that puts Reese, Kenzie and her young son in the sights of a killer.

From the Texas heat to the Louisiana bayous, Reese and his brothers must track down the truth before the body count gets any higher.

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Chapter One

Galveston, Texas: Last Day of July

Seconds after the chopper lifted off the pad, Reese felt the odd vibration.  Along with the pilot and co-pilot and five members of the crew, the Eurocopter EC135 was headed for the Poseidon offshore drilling platform. 

For a moment, the ride leveled out and Reese relaxed against his seat.  As CEO of Garrett Resources, the billion-dollar oil and gas company he owned with his brothers, he was always searching for the right investment to expand company holdings, the reason he was flying out to the platform.

For months he’d been working with Sea Titan Drilling, the owner of the offshore rig, to complete the five-hundred-million-dollar purchase, an extremely good value when the average price of a similar rig was around six-fifty. 

The vibration returned and with it came a grinding noise that put Reese on alert.  The men in the cabin began to glance back and forth and shift nervously in their seats.  A sharp jolt, then the chopper seemed to fall out of the sky.  It climbed again, began to dip and sway, dropped then climbed as the pilot fought for control.

The pilot’s deep voice rumbled through the headset.  “We’ve got a problem.  I don’t want you to panic, but we need to find a place to set down.” 

There was definitely a problem, Reese thought, as the vibration continued to worsen.  The chopper was out of control and the whole cabin was shaking as if it would break apart any minute.  His pulse was hammering, his adrenalin pumping.

 Along with the men in the crew who rode back and forth from the rig every few weeks, he stared out the window toward the ground.  They were no longer above the heliport.  Clearly the pilot was looking for an open space big enough to handle the thirty-six-foot blade span.  All Reese could see were the rooftops of warehouses and metal commercial buildings.

The chopper kept shaking.  The crew was grim-faced but resigned.  The pilot did something to take the pitch out of the rotors and the chopper started falling.

“No need to worry,” the pilot said.  “We’ll auto-rotate down.  I’ve done it a dozen times.”

Auto rotate down.  Reese knew the concept, the technique helicopter pilots used to land when the engine failed.  The trick was to find a safe place to hit the ground. 

Both engines went silent.  The blades were flat now, the wind whistling through them, tying his stomach into a knot.

“Brace for impact,” the pilot said.  Below them, Reese spotted an open flat slab of asphalt in the yard of a small trucking firm–the only possible landing site anywhere around.  Trouble was it didn’t look wide enough to handle the blades. 

At the last second, the pilot flared the helicopter in an effort to slow the descent, then the ground rushed up and the chopper hit with a jolt that wracked Reese’s whole body.

For an instant, he thought they were going to make it.  Then one of the spinning rotor blades hit the corner of a building and tore free.  The Plexiglas bubble shattered as the long metal blades exploded into a hundred deadly pieces, careening like knives through the air, slicing into buildings and the cabin of the helicopter. 

Reese didn’t feel the impact.  One moment he was conscious, then the world suddenly went black.

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Giveaway: Win a $20 Amazon e-gift card (US Dollars) and a digital copy of The Ultimate Betrayal! Giveaway runs from today until June 25th!

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About the Author

Kat Martin head shot (high res)

New York Times Bestselling author Kat Martin, a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara, currently resides in Missoula, Montana with Western-author husband, L. J. Martin.  More than seventeen million copies of Kat’s books are in print, and she has been published in twenty foreign countries.  Fifteen of her recent novels have taken top-ten spots on the New York Times Bestseller List, and her novel, BEYOND REASON, was recently optioned for a feature film.

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blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Five Things – Beth Merwood*

For nine-year-old Wendy, the summer of 1969 will never be forgotten.
Local kids have always told stories about the eerie wood on the outskirts of the village, and Wendy knows for sure that some of them are true. Now the school holidays have started and she’s going to the wood again with Anna and Sam, but they soon become convinced that someone is trying to frighten them off.
When a terrible event rocks the coastal community, the young friends can’t help thinking there must be a connection between the incident, the tales they’ve heard, and the strange
happenings they’ve begun to witness. As glimpses of a darker world threaten their carefree existence, they feel compelled to search out the underlying truth.

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Beth Merwood is from the south of England. The Five Things is her debut novel.

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My thoughts: this is a sweet and sad story about childhood and the death of a young boy. Wendy narrates the events of the summer of 1974, when her friend’s younger brother went missing. It shatters a lot of the innocence of simple summer pleasures and forces the children to grow up quickly – darkness forcing its way into their lives.

As she grows up, what happened to Tommy stays with her, as do The Five Things – the key points she and her friends felt were not fully investigated and could explain what led to Tommy’s death. Their beliefs may ultimately be wrong, but they attempt to find answers anyway.

A bittersweet tale of childhood’s end, when summer becomes darker and the real world intrudes.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Phosphate Rocks – Fiona Erskine*

During the demolition of a factory, a shocking discovery is made: a mummified corpse encased in a carapace of hardened dust – phosphate rock – surrounded by ten objects that provide tantalising clues as to its identity…

A professional engineer with forty years of international manufacturing experience, Fiona Erskine’s first graduate job was in the factory described in Phosphate Rocks. Born in Edinburgh, Fiona grew up riding motorbikes and jumping into cold water. After studying chemical engineering at university, she learned to weld, cast and machine with apprentices in Paisley. As a professional engineer she has worked and travelled internationally and is now based in the North East of England. Her first novel, The Chemical Detective, which was shortlisted for the Specsavers Debut Crime Novel Award 2020, was followed by The Chemical Reaction.

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My thoughts: this was really interesting in several different ways. As well as solving the death and putting a name to the body found beneath the old chemical factory, each object becomes the story of the men and women who worked there, of the chemicals they processed and the machines they used. It was utterly fascinating and so well written that even the science bits were absorbing (I’m not always very good with chemistry).

Inspired by the factory the author started her career in, and the real working men and women of Leith, this is an ode to a different time and the people who lived in it. Bits are very sad and shocking, but I found it utterly engaging and wanted to hear more stories of the various characters who could be found inside the factory gates.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour – 20/20 – Carl Goodman*

Can you see a killer before it’s too late?

On the first day of her new job, D.I. Eva Harris is called to the scene of a brutal murder at the heart of Surrey society. A shocking crime by a meticulous killer – who escaped with the victim’s eyes.

With the body drained of blood and no forensic evidence left at the scene, Harris’ efforts to find the killer becomes desperate. But as her investigation is complicated by corruption at the heart of the police, she doesn’t know who to trust on her own team.

As the pressure mounts, Eva realises the murder is even more horrific than it seems, and her own dreadful history threatens to be drawn out with it…

A dark and compulsive detective novel, for fans of Chris Carter and M.W Craven.

Carl Goodman is from Surrey and 20/20 is his first crime thriller. It introduces Eva Harris, a newly promoted DI with a computer science background, thrown in at the deep end with an especially gruesome murder. Carl likes hard-hitting, contemporary stories with dark and unusual themes and is currently working on more DI Eva Harris novels.

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My thoughts: this is a grisly one and no mistake. I could picture the exact scene in Le Chien Andalou as soon as it was mentioned. I think all the crime fiction I read means I’m not very squeamish but I know eyes are where some people (including Mr Mads) draw the line. It grosses them out too much. And I do get it. But it just doesn’t bother me. However, someone is killing innocent people and stealing their eyes, which is super weird and there might actually be two killers here.

I liked Eva, I felt a bit sorry for her as she was being manipulated by a particularly nasty boss, trying to solve two sets of murders, and not die because someone keeps trying to kill her. But she’s tough, holds her ground and does her job, even when, as a cyber specialist, she feels completely out of her depth. Her team are pretty capable too, and she comes to rely on them, building a strong relationship especially with Becka Flynn. I can’t wait to see what other cases await this crack team in leafy Surrey.

I related to the area too, my grandparents live not far from Kingston and I went there a lot as a teenager and student, so I know it well. Always entertaining seeing your old haunts through new eyes as it were!

I really enjoyed this book, I’d been in a bit of a slump and turns out what I needed was a series of truly brutal killings to get me out of it. Not entirely sure what that says about me though…

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Castle Shade – Laurie R. King*

A queen, a castle, a dark and ageless threat–all await Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes in this chilling new adventure.

The queen is Marie of Roumania: the doubly royal granddaughter of Victoria, Empress of the British Empire, and Alexander II, Tsar of Russia. A famous beauty who was married at seventeen into Roumania’s young dynasty, Marie had beguiled the Paris Peace Conference into returning her adopted country’s long-lost provinces, singlehandedly transforming Roumania from a backwater into a force.

The castle is Bran: a tall, quirky, ancient structure perched on high rocks overlooking the border between Roumania and its newly regained territory of Transylvania. The castle was a gift to Queen Marie, a thank-you from her people, and she loves it as she loves her own children.

The threat is . . . well, that is less clear. Shadowy figures, vague whispers, the fears of girls, dangers that may be only accidents. But this is a land of long memory and hidden corners, a land that had known Vlad the Impaler, a land from whose churchyards the shades creep.

When Queen Marie calls, Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes are as dubious as they are reluctant. But a young girl is involved, and a beautiful queen. Surely it won’t take long to shine light on this unlikely case of what would seem to be strigoi?

Or, as they are known in the West . . . vampires.

Laurie R King giveaway! There’s a great giveaway on the Allison & Busby website at the moment, it’s open to everyone and closes on June 30th. (Please let me win it!!)  

Order a copy of this book for £15, get a signed bookplate. Use code share15 and get free P&P too!

Listen to the author reading from Castle Shade on YouTube.

My thoughts: this was a really enjoyable edition to the Russell and Holmes series – one I’ve dipped in an out of but haven’t quite managed to read all of them yet. Mind you it took me a while to read all of the original Sherlock Holmes stories too.

An older Holmes and his spirited young wife and partner Mary Russell, head off to Romania at the request of its Queen Marie – granddaughter of Queen Victoria and one of the real figures in this series.

She is worried about a threat against her youngest daughter’s life and their happiness in Castle Bran (which may have inspired Bram Stoker’s Dracula) is damaged by her fears. Holmes and Russell investigate the spate of strange incidents that have occurred during the queen’s visits.

There’s lots of adventure and derring do in the nighttime countryside as the pair attempt to keep watch over the village and identify the culprit – then things escalate.

A really fun, slightly silly romp through 1920s history – royalty, the looming threat of the Bolsheviks in Russia (Queen Marie was Nicholas II’s cousin), hysteria, folklore and bitterness. Mary Russell is a tremendous character, a perfect modern female foil to Holmes’ slightly old fashioned ways and a lot quicker on the ball than dear Dr Watson back at home in London.

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