Tag: reviews

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.

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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.

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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.

Fearless, feisty and at the wheel of her bright orange campervan, newly-single Sadie is about to enter a new era… as a detective?!

It’s never too late for a second chance, and when Sadie Sutton’s marriage implodes spectacularly, she jumps into her vintage VW campervan and heads for the twisty cobbled streets and sea views of her childhood in the little seaside town of Winching. But her fresh start comes to an abrupt stop when she trips over a dead body, turning an ordinary walk with her faithful dog Sam Spade into a murder investigation!

Having failed to stop a balaclava-wearing suspect disappearing from the scene into the night, Sadie can’t help but take matters into her own hands. The victim, retired headmistress Charlotte Woolf, was well known around Winching for her sharp tongue – rumours suggest she was particularly disliked by her own husband! But he swears he doesn’t even like killing snails by mistake…

With the enthusiastic help of three women at the campsite who have all embraced Van Life, Sadie starts sleuthing. Who was sending Charlotte anonymous bunches of flowers that had her rattled? Do the members of the local sea swimming club hold a vital clue? Sadie and her friends are on the right track… until their prime suspect ends up dead in his garden shed!

Can Sadie get to the root of the problem and stop the killer before the next person is buried? Or will her fresh new chapter end with her driving her campervan back the way she came?

First in a brilliant new series from bestselling author Maeve Haran, this warm, witty and absolutely unputdownable cosy crime novel is perfect for fans of Agatha Christie, The Thursday Murder Club and Robert Thorogood.

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Maeve Haran is an Oxford law graduate who had a successful career in television before writing her worldwide bestseller Having It All , which was translated into twenty-six languages. She has written twenty contemporary novels, two historical novels, and a work of non-fiction in praise of life’s small pleasures. She has three grown up children and four grandchildren. She lives mainly in North London but escapes when she can to a much-loved cottage in the beautiful Cuckmere Valley near the sea in East Sussex. Her hobby is ignoring age and having a good time!

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My thoughts: Discovering her husband in bed with her best friend, Sadie scoops her little dog Sam Spade up, buys a campervan and heads off to the beach where she had a great time as a child, hoping to start again.

Out for a walk, she comes across the body of retired headteacher Charlotte Woolf. Teaming up with the other Vintage Vanettes, while the police inspector is fixated on the victim’s husband, she needs to solve this herself.

This was really fun, funny and enjoyable start to a new series, I liked Sadie and little Sam, as well as her new friends. They’re smart and capable and solved the case ahead of the local police, proving they’ve got great instincts. Can’t wait for book two!

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

Baz Swoon is on the brink of the biggest deal of his life when two brutal
murders shatter rural Maine — and all the evidence points straight at him.

His wife, Melanie, already wary of his secrets and long absences, questions the
man she thought she knew.

Detective Philippa Fraiser heads south to North Carolina, and together with
Lieutenant Marquez, they uncover a pattern too precise to be a coincidence.

Someone is orchestrating the perfect frame — always one step ahead.

As Baz’s world unravels, his reputation, marriage, and freedom hang by a thread.
But the deeper Philippa digs, the clearer it becomes. This isn’t just a setup.

The killer is studying everyone.

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Alistair Birch is a thriller writer and occasional poet, penning silly and
poignant rhymes. After two stints with separate publishers, he turned indie in 2024, producing a nineteen-eighties psychological thriller, The Evil Within, followed up by a co-authored epic historical thriller, The Girl from Berchtesgaden.

The re-release of his two-book, modern action thriller series, Shadow Pursuit and Shadow Play, came next and in 2026 he’s begun a new US-based detective procedural series. Book one is called Two States One Killer with the sequel, Cold Vein, well into production.

Outside of writing, Alistair works in IT and has volunteered as a facilitator in a mental health charity. He loves to cook, and occasionally head out for a run.

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My thoughts: The evidence builds against Baz, and the police are soon on his trail, only he doesn’t even know that they think he might have murdered two people. He’s busy organising a buyout of his business, or so he thinks. The only person he trusts is Nick, but is he wrong to do so?

When detective Philippa Fraiser arrives in North Carolina from Maine, she thinks it’s a pretty solid case, except her prime suspect has never been to Maine, and then his assistant Cindy disappears, swiftly followed by Baz himself. What is going on?

As Philippa and Martinez search for the man, a series of rather obvious clues left for them, lead them to think someone else is manipulating things, pulling Baz’s strings. And they might be dangerous.

A clever, twisty story, where it’s hard to know exactly who to believe in until it all starts to become clear, and fall apart, as the police close in on their killer, just as he thinks he’s got away with it.

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

Lesley seems like a perfectly normal woman. Until you ask her to leave.

Gillian wants to do right by her elderly Aunt Myra. A safe nursing home. Daily visits. A peaceful final chapter for the woman who has been like a mother to her.
A plan that’s derailed when a stranger turns up on the doorstep claiming to be Myra’s long-lost niece, Lesley. She says she’s here to look after Myra.

Within days, Myra’s bank accounts are being drained and Lesley has taken full control of the house. And Gillian—the woman who has always been there for Myra—isn’t allowed through the door.

When she demands to see her aunt, the threats begin. Smashed windows. A slashed tire.
Headlights chasing her down a lonely country road.
But Gillian isn’t backing off.

Suspicious that Lesley isn’t who she says she is, Gillian digs into her past. And discovers a secret far more horrifying than anything she could have imagined.

A chilling, twist-laden thriller about the people we let through the door, and what they take when we do.

Don’t Let Her In – the shocking psychological thriller, perfect for fans of B.A. Paris, Shari Lapena, and Lesley Pearse.

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I hail from Mayo in the west of Ireland, although I spent much of my life away, in the US, UK, Europe, Jersey in the Channel Islands and various parts of Ireland. In my
younger years I was incredibly restless. I left home and school at 16 and spread my
wings.

I’ve had over forty jobs, everything from barman, labourer, staff newspaper reporter, soldier in the Irish army, station foreman with London Underground, mason, and many more besides. I returned to education as a mature student in the early noughties and hold a BA in history and sociology from the National University of Ireland at Maynooth, and an M.Phil in creative writing (first class honours with distinction) from Trinity College Dublin.

Since 2005 I’ve been a civilian employee of the Irish police, An Garda Síochána.
However, I’ve been on extended sick leave since 2015 following a mystery illness
which struck while travelling in Spain. It almost killed me. The doctors never got to
the bottom of it and they call me the Mystery Man. But every cloud has a silver lining.
It has given me the time to write.

Although I’ve been writing all my life, most of my output languishes in the bottom of drawers. Under my real name, Michael Scanlon, I was published for the first time in 2019 by Bookouture with the first of three crime novels.

Working with Inkubator is a great opportunity because I think I’ve learned something since becoming published and I want to put it into practice. It is a new departure and I have adopted a pseudonym because the books are so different. I hope readers like them.

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My thoughts: Poor Aunty Myra, her nieces by marriage have always been there for her, especially Gillian, but now her long-lost niece has arrived from Scotland with her brutish husband and grown up grandsons to “look after” her. Gillian is immediately suspicious.

They won’t let her visit, the formerly impeccable house is a mess, then Myra ends up in hospital after a fall. She’s not with it and seems incredibly groggy and sleepy. The nurse at the hospital is suspicious too.

Gillian has been dealing with several scary things, her windows are smashed, her tyres slashed and she feels terrified, she’s positive it’s the Cuckoos (as she calls them) but has no proof. Until a chance phone call with Myra’s great-nephew fills her in. Now to try and get the police to do something.

There’s also a little time for romance too, in the form of hunky farmer Paddy, who comes to her aid at the Thursday night dance in the community centre. Gillian doesn’t feel so alone with him around, and her sisters are on side too. Can they save Aunty Myra from her so-called niece before it’s too late?

I was hooked, Gillian just wanted the best for a woman she’d known and loved her whole life and Lesley was a bit suspect from the off, she certainly had all the answers. Her family are awful and Myra’s lovely home is soon a total mess, a far cry from the way it is right at the beginning. It was just a shame no one official took a closer look at the family before moving on. A clever and nasty woman vs a kind and trusting one. It never ends well.  

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

DETECTIVE KATE HAMBLIN IS FIGHTING FOR HER CAREER – AND MAYBE HER LIFE – IN THE GRIPPING CRIME THRILLER FROM A FORMER POLICE OFFICER.

Elderly Agnes Everard never stood a chance. The car slams into her at breakneck speed, then vanishes in a cloud of billowing smoke and burned rubber.

Hours later, two officers knock on Detective Kate’s door. A witness swears it was Kate’s vehicle that hit Agnes Everard – and the evidence agrees.
Kate knows it’s a lie. But before she can fight back, she’s suspended, her badge stripped away, her reputation in tatters.

With the help of her loyal husband Hayden – the only person who believes she’s innocent – Kate sets out to investigate. A tip-off leads to a rented flat in Highbridge – and a body at the foot of the stairs, neck snapped, eyes staring. Kate realizes Agnes wasn’t the only target.

Someone is orchestrating this. Someone who’s watching Kate closely.

Someone who knows exactly how to destroy her – and is prepared to kill anyone who gets in the way.

With her career on the line and the net tightening, Kate must uncover who wants her ruined – before she becomes the next body on the floor.

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David Hodges served in the Thames Valley Police, from the rank of Constable to
Superintendent, retiring after thirty years with the force. During that time, he gained
wide experience in numerous operational and management roles, including both urban and rural policing, membership of the tactical Support Group, an authorised firearms and public order unit, and departmental and operational command. Prior to his retirement, he was appointed the force Press, Public Relations Officer and completed his career as the head of Corporate Communication.

A prolific writer, with fifteen crime novels published so far, including ten in his
Somerset Murder Series, David is a member of the Society of Authors, the Crime Writers and Crime Readers Associations and International Thriller Writers.

An active supporter of public libraries, and keenly interested in wildlife and the
countryside, he is married, with two daughters and four grandchildren, and now lives in beautiful Pembrokeshire, where he can fully indulge his passion for writing.

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My thoughts: Framing a police officer for the hit and run of an elderly lady was never really going to work. Detective Inspector Kate Lewis is too clever and too determined to just roll over and take the blame. She knows she’s innocent, and she’ll do whatever it takes to prove it.

With the help of her loyal husband (and fellow police officer) Hayden, she’s soon tracking down answers, even if some of her senior officers would rather see her go down for it.

There’s lots of twists and turns as Kate digs into the case, determined to prove her innocence and stop whoever it is that’s out to destroy her. They don’t seem to want her dead, but her career and life in ruins. Who could be so motivated?

A smart and engaging investigation, a clever and dogged protagonist, a psychopathic criminal, it’s a heady mix and a great 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.