A closed room murder with a twist.
The room is a van, on top of a multi-storey car park, in Reading, in the middle of a storm.
TV personality, and Storm Chaser, Dr Simon Sharp lies multilateral in the van full of high-spec tech. With him, alive and unharmed is Dr Finn Mason. The van is locked from the inside and Finn is refusing to come out unless his best friend is called.
His best friend just happens to be DS Robin Butler of Hampshire Police.
Butler arrives and Finn is taken from the van. But what has happened inside. The local police think they have a nailed-on case of murder with Finn as the only logical suspect.
Butler admits that is the case, but still thinks it’s out of character for his friend, until he starts to dig, and then he realises Finn is not the person he thought he knew so well.
Meanwhile Butler’s side kick DC, Freya West is tasked to help new Acting DS Josh Smith with the investigation into the death of a homeless man found in an abandoned freezer the morning after the storm.
Whilst concentrating on her own case she worries about Butler and soon finds herself helping him try to work out why Finn might have changed so much, and why he might have killed a fellow scientist in such a grisly manner.
This is the second book in the DS Butler series, and just like the first, it’s original and intriguing.
The storyline had me coming up for the occasional breath between chapters. It’s simple, yet complex.
The frustrations Butler feels when he realises he doesn’t know his friend as well as he thought he did, and in some way has let him down, is really well written into the plot.
The relationships between Butler and Finns family is stretched. The building friendship with his DC, Freya, is addictive.
The story as a whole had me not must hooked, but left me wanting more. Always a good sign.
Pages: 297. Publisher: Canelo Crime. Published on: 9th September 2021
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