Tag: thrillers

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

Hundreds of human cages hidden in the desert. One man with nothing to lose.

Christopher Wren pulls off I-70 after three weeks on the road and walks into a biker bar in Price, Utah. An arbitrary decision he’s about to regret.

The bikers attack Wren, leave him for dead and steal his truck.

Now he’s going to get it back.

From a secure warehouse in the desert. Ringed with fences. Filled with human cages.

As Wren digs deeper, a dark national conspiracy unravels and the body count mounts, but one thing is for sure.

They picked the wrong guy to teach a lesson.

Amazon UK Amazon US Audible

Mike Grist is the British/American author of the Christopher Wren thriller series. For 11 years Mike lived in Tokyo, Japan, exploring and photographing the dark side of the city and the country: gangs, cults and abandonedplaces. Now he writes from London, UK, about rogue DELTA operator Christopher Wren – an anti-hero vigilante who uses his off-book team of ex-cons to bring brutal payback for dark crimes.

Twitter Facebook Website

My thoughts:

Wren is an interesting character, the survivor of a cult, leader of a quasi-cult organisation, man who brings down other dangerous organisations, some time CIA agent, all mixed with guilt and terrible PTSD, making him an oddly charismatic, if a little untrustworthy protagonist.

He uses his strengths, and his network of co-dependent followers, to break open a biker gang, a human trafficking ring that turns out to be a cult obsessed with starting a race war, and keeps just ahead of the CIA team on his trail.

High octane, lots of bullets and blood, plus the thinking, or not, behind cult leaders dissected, the start of a new series of thrillers.

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

When Emily applies for a job as a housekeeper for widower Rupert, it’s a chance to start over – a steady job and regular money means she can work towards her own place, not sharing a grimy flat with old mate, Mags.

As Emily gets to know more about Rupert’s world – how he likes his supper when he comes in from work, who his friends are – she can make sure everything runs like clockwork for him.

Soon there’s a spark between them; Rupert likes Emily and invites her to stay. For good.

To the outside world, they really seem to be a perfect match. There’s just the small issue of what really happened to Rupert’s first wife…

My thoughts:

I’m not entirely sure which character I like the least as pretty much everyone in this book is a toxic nightmare. Which is half the fun.

Wealth and privilege give a veneer of respectability to some pretty nasty things that people living in nice houses get upto.

Emily drops her only real friend for Rupert’s spoiled and narcissistic friends as soon as she can, spending her husband’s money all over town, shopping as a lifestyle.

Rupert isn’t as nice as he appears, constantly gaslighting her and comparing his previous wife to her.

His friends are all pretty awful. Grasping and vacuous and cruel.

But of course it’s the drip, drip of poison that Emily starts to feel, the sensation of being watched, the strange things that keep happening, her growing fear about what happened to her new husband’s first wife…it all builds to a serious of twists and the life they’ve built comes tumbling down.

Chilling and a bit creepy, these awful people deserve one another.

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

PENANCE is the first book in a series of crime novels featuring retired Boston homicide detective John Gilfillan. This story is about the race to find Lori Doyle. Ten years ago, Lori, as a teenager, witnessed a killing. Today, she has established a new life for herself and her daughter in Maine under an alias. Unbeknownst to her, all that’s about to change, as some are seeking her out to do her harm and some to do her good. A page-turner to keep you in suspense until the end.

Edward Daniel Hunt’s short stories have appeared in the Scarlett Leaf Review, Down in the Dirt Magazine and Adelaide Literary Magazine. “Hit Men Have Feelings Too” was named a finalist in Adelaide Magazine’s 2018 Literary Award Contest for Best Short Story. He lives in Old Orchard Beach, Maine, within walking distance of the ocean.

My thoughts:

This was an interesting book that began as a thriller but became more about people and their relationships, their lives.

Tommy is out of prison and looking for his ex-wife, the only witness to a murder he was involved in, she, Lori, has moved away and rebuilt her life, finding new family and friends in the process.

Retired cop turned PI Gilfillan is hired to find her too, to see if she can help solve the long cold case of a murdered doctor. He is also rebuilding his life post-retirement, in his beach front home in Maine.

Both men follow tenuous leads from Lori’s family, to friends and acquaintances, trying to find her before anyone else does.

Lori has been lucky, becoming the lodger of an elderly widow, who treats her and her young daughter, more like family and building a new relationship with a colleague at the diner she waitresses in. She knows that her ex-husband will be looking for her however.

The narrative weaves between the protagonists, showing their lives and loves against the backdrop of the search for Lori.

The ending is left open, presumably for a sequel, but with the strong suggestion that some of Lori’s fears may be laid to rest.

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

1648. Alie Gowdie marries Richard Webster during a turbulent time in Scotland’s history. Charles I is about to lose his head, and little does Alie know that she too will meet a grisly end within the year.

2019. Sarah Sutherland is struggling to cope with the demands of her day job, caring for her elderly father and keeping tabs on her backpacking daughter. She wanted to be an archaeologist, but now in her forties, she is divorced, alone, and there seems to be no respite, no glimmer of excitement on the horizon. However, she does have a special affinity with the Kilgour Witch, Alie Gowdie, who lived in Sarah’s cottage until her execution in 1648, and Sarah likes nothing better than to retreat into a world of sorcery, spells and religious fanaticism.

Her stories delight tourists as she leads them along the cobbled streets of her home town, but what really lies behind the tale of Alie Gowdie, the Kilgour Witch? Can Sarah uncover the truth in order to right a centuries-old wrong? And what else might modern-day Kilgour be hiding, just out of sight?

However, she does have a special affinity with the Kilgour Witch, Alie Gowdie, who lived in Sarah’s cottage until her execution in 1648, and Sarah likes nothing better than to retreat into a world of sorcery, spells and religious fanaticism.

Her stories delight tourists as she leads them along the cobbled streets of her home town, but what really lies behind the tale of Alie Gowdie, the Kilgour Witch? Can Sarah uncover the truth in order to right a centuries-old wrong? And what else might modern-day Kilgour be hiding, just out of sight?

Amazon

Author Bio

Sandra Ireland was awarded a Carnegie-Cameron scholarship to study for an MLitt in Writing Practice and Study at the University of Dundee, graduating with a distinction in 2014. Her work has appeared in various publications and women’s magazines. She is the author of Beneath the Skin (2016), Bone Deep (2018) and The Unmaking of Ellie Rook (2019). She lives in Carnoustie, Scotland.

My thoughts:

This was a clever, engaging read, reflecting modern day events back to the 17th Century witch trials. Sarah and Grant are so enthralled with unravelling a centuries old tale they almost miss something right in front of their faces.

Sarah’s dad is seeing things, or is he? Slowly they unravel two terrible crimes, four hundred years apart.

With whispers of magic and mystery, this is a captivating story of relationships and righting wrongs.

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

She tried to forget the horrors of war–but her quiet hometown conceals a litany of new evils.

Sergeant Camille Waresch did everything she could to forget Iraq. She went home to Eastern Washington and got a quiet job. She connected with her daughter, Sophie, whom she had left as a baby. She got sober. But the ghosts of her past were never far behind.
While conducting a routine property tax inspection on an isolated ranch, Camille discovers a teenager’s tortured corpse hanging in a dilapidated outbuilding. In a flash, her combat-related PTSD resurges–and in her dreams, the hanging boy merges with a young soldier whose eerily similar death still haunts her. The case hits home when Sophie reveals that the victim was her ex-boyfriend–and as Camille investigates, she uncovers a tangled trail that leads to his jealous younger brother and her own daughter, wild, defiant, and ensnared.
The closer Camille gets to the truth, the closer she is driven to the edge. Her home is broken into. Her truck is blown up. Evidence and witnesses she remembers clearly are erased. And when Sophie disappears, Camille’s hunt for justice becomes a hunt for her child. At a remote compound where the terrifying truth is finally revealed, Camille has one last chance to save her daughter–and redeem her own shattered soul.

Amazon US Amazon UK

Google Books Book Depository

Barnes and Noble

Elizabeth Lewes is a U.S. Navy veteran who served during Operation Enduring Freedom as a linguist. A practicing attorney, she resides in Seattle with her family.

Social Media:

Twitter Instagram

My thoughts:

Camisole finds the tortured, murdered body of a teenager in a barn and sparks an investigation into local criminals that comes a little too close to home.

Suffering from PTSD and unsure how reliable her memory is, frustrated by the police’s glacial pace, she starts investigating herself, getting entangled in a web of very dangerous people, who do not want her nosing around.

Fast paced and with an unreliable narrator, this is a clever, intense thriller, with shocks and twists that throw Camille and the reader curveballs as she ricochets around Little Falls.

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

Who can you trust, if you can’t trust yourself?

Alice Hunter, grieving and troubled after a breakdown, stumbles on the body of her friend and trustee, Harry Rook. The police determine he has been ritually murdered and suspicion falls on the vulnerable Alice, who inherited the place known locally as The Witch House from her grandmother, late High Priestess of the local coven.

When the investigations turn up more evidence, and it all seems to point to Alice, even she begins to doubt herself.

Can she find the courage to confront the secrets and lies at the heart of her family and community to uncover the truth, prove her sanity, and clear herself of murder?

Ann Rawson has long been addicted to story. As a child she longed to learn to read because she knew there was magic in those pages, the inky squiggles that turned into words and became images in her head – the stories that could transport her away from the everyday. As she grew older, she divined there was truth in books too. They were a glimpse into other minds. Her reading became the foundation of a deep and abiding interest in what makes people tick – and so she soon became hooked on crime fiction.

Age ten, she wrote to Malcolm Saville, author of the Lone Pine Series, enclosing her first short story. He wrote back and encouraged her to continue writing – and she is heartbroken that the letter is long lost. His book, Lone Pine Five, sparked a lifelong interest in archaeology, as it mentions the Mildenhall Treasure which makes an appearance in The Witch House.

A lapsed witch with enduring pagan tendencies, she lives on the south coast. She still thinks of herself as a Northerner, although she’s been in exile for many years. Almost every day she walks on the Downs or the white cliffs with her husband, plotting her next novel while he designs computer systems.

Ann’s debut novel, A Savage Art was published by Fahrenheit Press in 2016. She has published some short fiction, and in 2019 her memoir piece If… was shortlisted for the Fish Short Memoir Prize.

She is currently completing a memoir and working on her third novel.

Twitter Facebook Blog

My thoughts:

This was a really interesting story about family and inheritance, mental illness and anger.

Alice is arrested for murder, but due to her history of mental illness and paranoia doesn’t convince the police that she’s innocent – especially as the victim was the trustee of her grandmother’s estate and controlled Alice’s allowance.

Deciding to go rogue and solve the crime herself, aided by friend Kelly, archeology professor and lawyer, she unravels a whole heap of family secrets and lies.

Beautifully written and compelling, I found this novel full of little surprises and clever twists. There is a great love of the landscape present in the novel and it forms almost another character in the story, so much of the action taking place on the Downs.

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

S J Watson writes:

In writing Final Cut I wanted to move away slightly from the entirely domestic, urban and claustrophobic feel of Before I Go To Sleep and open the story world a little. I’m returning to my preoccupations of memory, narrative and identity, though bringing a fresh spin and new maturity to them.

The story follows a young ambitious documentary film maker whose first film was lauded and her second less so, and who is struggling with her third film. She hits on the idea of making a film about life in a small, northern village and is persuaded, against her better judgement and for reasons unknown, to film in Blackwood Bay. Once there she discovers a town shrouded in mystery and full of secrets, that threaten to engulf and ultimately destroy her. She has to dig deep to save herself, as well as the lives of others.

In researching the book, I was drawn to the idea of the way we document our lives now, on Instagram and Twitter etc., and the downsides of that, as well as the darkness that can hide in plain sight and the abuses that people can visit on their fellow humans. The sad fact is I had to tone down some of the horrific atrocities I read about, or else the book would’ve been too dark, even for me.

S. J. Watson’s first novel, Before I Go To Sleep, became a phenomenal international success and has now sold over 6,000,000 copies worldwide. It won the Crime Writers’ Association Award for Best Debut Novel and the Galaxy National Book Award for Crime Thriller of the Year.

The film of the book, starring Nicole Kidman, Colin Firth and Mark Strong, and directed by Rowan Joffe, was released in September 2014.

S. J. Watson’s second novel, Second Life, a psychological thriller, was published to acclaim in 2015.

S. J. Watson was born in the Midlands and now lives in London.

My thoughts:

This was really interesting, playing with concepts of memory and trust. Can Alex trust her own memories or anyone else’s? Why can’t she remember why she ran away?

For such a small town Blackwood Bay bristles with secrets and mysteries, rather than everyone knowing each other’s business.

The use of anonymous snippets of phone footage to plant clues and the film Alex says she’s making bring it up to date and add another dimension.

A very clever thriller that twists and turns, with an unreliable narrator and untrustworthy characters.

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

A hint of gold glistened in the sand. It was a watch, no doubt about it. A watch… attached to a body.

Criminal psychologist Robyn Adams is at breaking point after a previous case resulted in an attempt on her own life. But as she sits in the car about to head home, her phone rings. It’s Robyn’s cousin, Vicky Carter, who she hasn’t seen or heard from in years.

Vicky’s voice cracks down the phone. Her husband, Simon, has been found buried on Golden Sands beach. Desperate to help and determined not to let her last case get the better of her, Robyn returns to the coastal village where she spent summers with Vicky as a child.

Robyn knows that she has let Vicky down in the past and is set on making up for lost time. Throwing herself into the case, she combs through evidence, intent on discovering a lead that will help the local police.

But there is clearly someone who wants Robyn gone. She is convinced someone is watching her and when she begins to receive threatening notes, Robyn knows that she could be risking her life…

But Robyn won’t leave again – she owes it to Vicky to stay.

My thoughts:

An enjoyable thriller, where one person’s growing paranoia threatens to unravel everything around them.

Robyn needs a break, moving straight from a serial killer case that could have killed her to a more personal one involving her family members has a detrimental affect on her mental wellbeing and sends her spiralling.

Her past resurfaces and her relationship with her cousin threatens to fall apart completely. Complicating matters is her rocky professional agreement with the local police and her decision to try and solve the murder on her own.

The case takes a back seat to Robyn’s growing crisis and becomes more of a book about her not managing her issues and how dangerous that can be.

I found this book interesting and enjoyable as it was more than the average thriller it initially appeared to be.

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