Tag: Crime Thriller

The Body In Nightingale Park. Nick Louth

Billed as the final instalment of the DCI Craig Gillard series I read this book with some trepidation. I’ve really enjoyed this series and didn’t really want it to end but Nick Louth has dealt with the ending brilliantly.

The frustrations of being a Police Officer and maintaining a personal life is depicted really well

As the SIO of some very high profile investigations Gillard has always put his family slightly behind his job whilst always being a loving and caring husband.

Now it’s different. Sam, Gillard’s wife is heavily pregnant, and even though he has been given reassurances that he can have leave to support her through the birth Gillard is called in again, and again.

The end of the series? I’m still not 100% sure we’ve heard the end of Gillard and his team. There is scope to have some of the characters move forward in their own series. But by the end of the book I was thinking how Gillard should really be left alone to enjoy faintly time as best as he can.

Publishers Gumpth

The final instalment of the DCI Gillard Crime Thrillers,

Another impossible case for DCI Gillard, but this time the answers are very close to home…

With a baby on the way, a pregnant wife to take care of and a new home to settle into, DCI Craig Gillard seems to have found a life of domestic bliss.

But when retired police sergeant Ken Stapleford is found stabbed to death in front of his own TV while watching Saturday afternoon football, Gillard’s peace is once again disturbed.

Only a day later, just a short walk from his new home, Gillard is himself witness to the killing of a jogger in Nightingale Park. A strange forensic connection emerges between the two killings, something that seems impossible. As he digs into the evidence, Gillard uncovers two more attacks, and any chance of taking time off for the birth of his child disappears.

And all the time the killer is circling closer and closer…

Perfect for fans of Stuart Macbride, Mark Billingham and Robert Bryndza.

What I thought

As always Nick Louth has written a brilliant Police Procedural Crime Thriller.

The crimes in this series have all been original, well conceived, and realistic, and this one is no exception.

Effectively Gillard is investigations two unrelated crimes, a series of rapes carried out in a park near his house, and a prominent influencer killed in the same park.

But the connections between these crimes soon become obvious, as does a more tenuous thread to the murder of a retired Police Officer being investigated by one of Gillard’s colleagues.

As more crimes get linked it looks almost impossible for one person to have carried out the attacks, over such a vast area, in such a relatively short time.

Gillard’s thinking, and the logic in which he applies his thoughts are really well written and just like the rest of the series I was hooked before the end of the first chapter.

As I said earlier I can see spin offs from this series.

Whatever Nick Louth decides, I’ll be at the front of the queue for his next book.

Pages: 323. Publisher: Canelo Crime. Publishing date: 17 August 2023

Salt Island. Lisa Towles

The way of writing that involves just one persons perspective, a story told from one persons point of view, through their eyes, through their thoughts and emotions, is one of the most effective ways of telling a story, and Lisa Towles is a master at it.

Billed as Ellwyn and Abernathy book 2, the story is purely told via Mari Ellwyn’s point of view, and this work’s fantastically.

Ellwyn starts the story in the British Virgin Islands on a personal quest but is quickly called back to California when her mother is taken ill.

Whilst there she is contacted by an old friend to look into things which are happening around a young entrepreneur that specialises in financing agricultural start ups and companies.

Somebody is trying to discredit Jack Darcy, but is anything they are doing illegal? The drip of intimidation is skating the edge of legality. Rumours that his high profile wife has been abducted only add to the intrigue, but no missing persons report has been filed.

Meanwhile Abernathy is off investigating the death of two brothers in an agricultural accident in a small farming town and keeps going “off-radar”.

Ellwyn employs some of the side characters from the series to help her with her investigations and to keep an eye on her Mom, who’s erratic behaviour in hospital can’t all be the result of her suffering a stroke.

When Ellwyn starts to receive warnings, it’s not about her case, it’s about her partners, but why do the people who are sending her the message also appear to be involved in her case.

A great story that has some complex plots weaving through it.

The frustrations felt by Ellwyn are passed to the reader because of the way the story is written. She, and the reader, do not know what is happening to her partner, until it’s revealed by her discoveries and observations.

The distraction of her Moms illness and behaviour diverts her from her investigations.

You would think that this style of writing is simplistic, but it’s not, it’s realistic.

We only know what we know. So why should that be any different in a book. I’ve fully brought into this series and I can’t wait for the next book

Pages: 297 Publisher: Indies United Publishing House. Available now

The Lies You Wrote. Brianna Labuskes

Of all the crime fiction books I’ve read, and that stretches into many hundreds, this is the first one I’ve read that has a Forensic Linguistic expert as it’s main character.

It’s an original approach and it really works. I can’t remember how many times I disappeared down a Google Rabbit Hole researching some of the terms and phrases used in this book, and it’s fascinating.

FBI linguistics specialist Raisa Susanto is called in to assist in a case which appears to be a copy cat murder.

A famous murder suicide some years before has been the point of speculation for the usual crime conspiracy theorists for years.

A young man murdered his mother and father before killing himself and leaving his three younger sisters without a family.

He left a suicide note and the local police decided it was a slam-dunk, open-and-shut case.

For years people have theorised that the investigation was too short. There were rumours in the small community that Alex Parker was a youth with issues, accusations of assaults by him on young girls were brushed over because his Mom and Dad were almost town “royalty”.

But there were rumours about them as well, was it a really a perfect marriage?

The suicide note has long been an item of speculation. Susanto uses it herself in lectures, hypothesising on its credibility and authenticity.

When a couple are found murdered, posed in the same way that the Parkers had been found, the FBI launch an investigation with Susanto, and Forensic Psychologist Callum Kilkenny making up part of the team.

The usual scepticism is thrown Susanto’s way. How can she be of any help.

But she can. Word patterns, phrases, unusual use of terms, inconsistencies in tenses, are just a small way she looks at the words written by different people involved in the investigation

And, because of her familiarity with the original crime, through her studies and lectures, she is uniquely placed to start spotting links.

So is this really a copycat, or is it more sinister.

As much as Alex Parker was a hateful figure, and easy to identify as the killer of his parents, did he really commit suicide or was he another victim.

This is a cracker of a story. I loved its originality.

Years ago I was involved in a murder investigation where Forensic Linguistics played a huge part in getting a man convicted of murdering his wife.

I’ve since seen that linguistic expert lecture to college and university students, and hold them captivated by the way he and his team have aided in criminal investigations.

So I’m not surprised that somebody has used a linguistic expert as their main character.

Thinking about it I’m more surprised by the fact that this is the first, that I’ve read, where it’s happened.

Billed as book one in the Raisa Susanto series I can only hope it’s the first of many, because if this book is anything to go by, it’s going to be a fantastic series. 🔲

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer. Publishing date: 28th November 2023 available on preorder

The Girl’s Last Cry. Alison Belsham

Detective Lexi Bennett book 2.

Its early in the series but I’m already really engaged with Lexi Bennett. As far as Detective Inspectors go in modern fiction Lexi is relatively “normal”, and for me that’s a refreshing change.

When she almost stumbles across a crime scene its the start of an investigation that takes us into an area that is becoming increasingly more concerning.

A young girl falls from a tower, but is it suicide or was she pushed?

The girl is a student at a school where she sings in the choir. It’s also a school where Lexi’s nephew is a student, and when he hears about the death he is insistent that Lexi finds out what really happened.

With her boss telling her that this investigation should be carried out by local officers, not Lexi’s major crime team, she asks to be let carry on until it can be established why the girl killed herself.

But then a second death, another musically talented child is found dead.

A coincidence? No

But who is responsible.

That is when the story goes into a world that is becoming a daily reality.

Influnencers.

Puppeteers working online to bend peoples thoughts and emotions, and in this case its not fashion trends they are pushing, or the latest music videos, it’s pushing vulnerable people to a place where they want to end their own lives. And then being there to make sure they don’t back out at the last second.

Lexi and her team work quickly to identify what is going on, and why these young people have taken their own lives.

The big question is, has a crime even been committed.

I really enjoyed this story. Yes, we as readers know straight away that somebody is leading these students, praying on their vulnerability, and is ultimately responsible for their deaths, but the Police don’t.

The tenacity of Lexi, and her team, does eventually lead to a proper investigation being carried out, but it takes time, and they take a lot of pressure from above to write the deaths off as not being suspicious.

The story plays on the fact that there are introverted vulnerable people that seek solace online, instead of turning to their family.

It shows the way people can hide behind pseudonyms and groom vulnerable people.

In my youth bullies were a physical presence. People that could not hide behind a keyboard or computer screen. They got away with being abusive by hiding their behaviour from those strong enough to stand up for the people who were suffering.

Today they can remain anonymous. Even the victim doesn’t know who they are being abused, or groomed by.

How is that a fair fight.

And if the victim isn’t ever physically touched, just coerced, from a distance, how can the police ever find a perpetrator.

There have been a few books covering this subject recently, including Robert Galbraith’s (Yes, I know who it is really) The Ink Black Heart, but this is the best one I’ve read.

A great story in a series that has quickly made it on to my must-reads-as-soon- as-available list.

Pages: 401. Publisher: Bookouture. Publishing Date. 11th July 2023

Out Of The Ashes. Louisa Scarr

As a retired Fire Officer, and current Fire Investigation Consultant and Fire Procedures and Science Lecturer, I always open books which contain fire scenes with trepidation. However, I have to say that this book has got everything spot on. The Fire Scenes, along with the interaction between the Police team and the Fire Investigation Officer, is stunningly accurate.

This is the fifth outing for Detectives West and Butler and just like the four before it it is a great read.

Now working in two separate forces it takes a cross boarder crime to bring the two together as a team, which is not to everybody’s liking.

At first they are kept apart, West investigating a stalker, and Butler investigating an arsonist that has set fires in both force areas.

When the teams realise that they may be dealing with the same person committing both crimes it is inevitable that they start to work closely together again, and the old spark is rekindled, in more ways than one.

As with real fire setters the crime of setting the fire begins to escalate. And when the frequency of when they are set isn’t enough, the severity and dangers to others start t increase.

But when two people die in different fires are they randomly unlucky or is there a connection to the fire starter.

If the stalker is responsible is the target of his attentions in danger from an arson attack.

The tension mounts as the investigation continues, who is the fire setting stalker, and why are they not leaving any evidence that might identify them.

Meanwhile the relationship between West and Butler is also smouldering. The year working in different forces, and the fact that they are both in relationships hasn’t done anything to dampen that fire.

Can they both concentrate on the case, and keep each other at arms length.

The want the case over quickly. One of them will take unnecessary risks. This story might not have the happy ever after ending.

What a book. Without other commitments it would have been a one sitting read, what it was was a distraction when I should have been doing other things. Brilliant.

I was convinced I knew who the stalking fire setter was, and I’m sure that was because of some canny writing, but it wasn’t until they were revealed that I realised I was wrong.

A clever plot, completely realistic, and a brilliant balance of crime investigation and personal battles amongst the main characters.

Pages: 411. Publisher: Canelo Crime. Publishing date: 6 July 2023

Deadly Fate. Angela Marsons

Book 18 of my favourite series is yet another one which raises the bar.

I have been with this series since book one, and the way Angela Marsons keeps the series fresh and relevant has amazed me.

It can’t be easy to be original in such a crowded genre, but somehow she manages to do it.

On top of that she has me reaching for Google on more than one occasion. This time it was to delve into the world of Psychics and Mediums, and not in a fanciful way.

The use of Barnum Phrases made so much sense when I found out what they are.

Murders happen in all sorts of communities and effect all sorts of people.

People who say they can contact the dead will always be controversial. But it’s not just sceptics, there’s a snobbery amongst the people with the “gift”

Mix religious beliefs in with that and there are numerous reasons to Murder.

The publishers blurb


The woman’s bright blonde hair floats in the breeze. She almost looks like she could be resting on the soft green grass. But her brown eyes stare unblinking up at the sky, and the final cut across her mouth is dark with blood. Her words silenced forever…

Late one evening, as the final church bell rings out, Sandra Deakin’s cold and lifeless body is found in the overgrown graveyard with multiple stab wounds. When Detective Kim Stone rushes to the scene, the violence of the attack convinces her that this murder was deeply personal. What could have caused such hate?

As the team dig into Sandra’s life, they discover she believed she could communicate with the dead. Was that why she was targeted? The last people to see her alive were a group of women who had a session with her the night before she was killed, and as Kim and her team pay them a visit, they soon learn each of the women is lying about why they wanted Sandra’s help…

Kim realises she must dig deep and open her mind to every avenue if she’s going to stand a chance at solving this case. And when she learns that Sandra was banned from the church grounds and had been receiving death threats too, she’s ever more certain that Sandra’s gifts are at the heart of everything.

But just when she thinks she’s found a lead, the broken body of a nineteen-year-old boy is found outside a call centre – a single slash across his mouth just like Sandra’s. Kim knows they are now racing against time to understand what triggered these attacks, and to stop a twisted killer.

But they might be too late. Just as Kim sits down at a local psychic show she discovers something that makes her blood run cold. Both Sandra and the call centre were named in an article about frauds. And this show stars the next name on the list. She looks around the audience with a feeling of utter dread, certain the killer is among them…

What I thought

I’ve run out of words to use in praise of the books in this series, brilliant, fantastic, excellent and any other word I could find in a thesaurus to match, and yes this book is at least as good as all of the rest.

Would I recommend it to friends. I think they’re all fed up of me saying “you need to read the latest Angela Marsons” but they’re all going to hear it again about Deadly Fate.

Another brilliant addition to the best crime fiction series on the shelves

Amz: https://geni.us/B0BWS4G1V5cover

Apple: http://ow.ly/Arq550N3kI9

Kobo: http://ow.ly/lVaF50N3kHk

Google: http://ow.ly/6sjR50N3kFY

The Blue Pool Murders & The Lighthouse Murders. Rachel McLean

Books seven and eight in the Dorset Crime series, which in itself is a spin off from the Birmingham Crime Series, both of which have interwoven themes, running storylines and shared characters

Although these books can be read as standalone stories I would really suggest, and highly recommend, that the reader invested in the books that come before, because this is a brilliant continuing story, that will have fans of the TV series Line of Duty salivating.

DCI Lesley Clarke moved from the West Midlands to Dorset as a form of recovery following an injury during a terrorist attack. There were a few of things she didn’t expect.

Firstly that Dorset was going to be the scene of so many murders.

Secondly that she would be dealing with major crime lords

Thirdly, and most significantly that she would fall into a situation that would involve her investigating the death of her predecessor, a death formally recorded as suicide, but which is beginning to look more and more suspicious.

Her investigations into the death of retired DCI Mackie seems to be inextricably linked to her current investigations and, because she doesn’t know who she can trust, she turns to a selective few of her new colleagues, one of her old ones and surprisingly a local journalist.

That is the running theme throughout this series and it’s addictive

Book 7 The Blue Pool Murders, sees Lesley and her team investigating the death of a Local Crime Boss.

His body is found floating in an isolated pool in a nature reserve. The one piece of evidence at the scene points to somebody very close to her. Should she hide it, there’s already enough duplicity and underhand behaviour in the force, does she need to add to it. Or is somebody trying to discredit her, or have her removed from the Major Investigation Team by having her credibility as a neutral investigator brought into question.

As the bodies mount, and Clarke and her team get closer to the truth, the links to Mackie also start to add up.

Book 8 The Lighthouse Murder starts with a body discovered in Portland Bill Lighthouse. The victim is linked to Lesley. Her team in Birmingham put him away just before she moved south.

He should still be in prison but his escape was rigged when he was being transferred from one of the Dorset Prisons.

The big question is why was he killed within hours of escaping.

Again the bodies mount up but Clarke is without one of her team. A major player, her DS has been arrested and suspended.

She feels like it’s getting harder to keep investigations on the right track.

When Police Officers start “running interference” on her investigations, in apparent careless but innocent ways her paranoia of who to trust deepens.

She returns to Birmingham as part of the investigation and starts to interact with her old DI Zoe Finch, the one copper she knows she can trust.

These two books almost finish off the running story.

Book 9, The Ghost Village is out this summer and according to the publicity material it is the book in which the story concludes

I quickly became hooked on Rachel McLeans books when I read the first of the Zoe Finch books set in Birmingham. Now her works is amongst my favourite Crime Fiction being written today.

As her books are published they go straight to the top of my reading pile, and never get relegated.

Brilliant.

Those Empty Eyes. Charlie Donlea

A teenage girl is the only survivor when her family are gunned down in the middle of the night.

A TV crew are at the house when she’s led out of the house in handcuffs.

The reporter, a young up and comer who is desperate to make her name, looks at her and says to the camera. Her eyes are empty.

Charged with the murder she spends two months in juvenile prison before the case is dropped. But the damage is done. The world knows Alexandra Quinlan as the girl with empty eyes, and with nobody else charged with the murder her guilt is assumed by nearly everyone

That leads to her life being made a misery by the “True-Crime-Junkies” who live their lives as armchair detectives.

Driven to change her name and move abroad she becomes Alex Armstrong and joins the armchair detective brigade as she tries to find out who killed her family.

This story looks at the problems caused by over zealous reporting hanging tags on people before guilt is proven, with the struggle to find the real murderer the only way of ever having peace.

Whilst looking into the death of her parents Alex uncovers some crimes which run parallel to her investigations.

Eerily similar to Jeffery Epstein and his celebrity sex rings there is an undercurrent of abuse that reaches high levels.

This s a cracking story.

It is realistic in every way. U.K. crime fans will be more aware of the problems that have besieged some innocent people in the States since the Nicola Bulley debacle.

This forms the spine of this story, which spreads over 10 years.

The transformation from Alexandra Quinlan to Alex Armstrong is mesmerising.

The interactions she has along the way, friendships formed, allegiances made and characters met are compelling.

I’ve been struggling of late to stick with a book. Most readers go through these phases and it only takes one good book to kick you back into the reading habit.

Those Empty Eyes was that book for me. It’s the first book I’ve picked up for months that I’ve read in one go, cover to cover, and enjoyed every page.

Pages: 384. Publisher: Canelo Crime. Publishing Date 4th May 2023

The Art Merchant. J.K Flynn

When I was browsing through Amazon looking for a new author to read I came across this introductory paragraph

“An Alcoholic, sex addicted detective finds herself fighting her superiors in a bid to bring down a local crime boss”

It caught my attention but for the wrong reasons. My initial thought was “another one”. But something about the cover, or the description in the rest of the gumph, peaked my interest and I downloaded it.

Thank God I did

What a book. The Detective is DS Esther Penman. In her immediate bosses words “the best police officer he’s ever worked with” but it comes at a cost.

She has a brilliant analytical mind, when it’s not rugged with vodka.

She puts in hours of work but is often late.

In her words she’s woke up under too many strange ceilings, not knowing how she got there, again because of the vodka.

Her attitude toward people can at best be described as sketchy.

Her general admin is awful but, when it counts, when files are sent to the CPS, or Court Files need preparing, she is brilliant.

Esther as a character is superbly written.

Flynn understands the psychology of the functioning alcoholic. The sex addiction is just another form of self harm. The conflict between knowing what she is doing is wrong, and actually stopping is a fight played out in her head, and on the pages of the book.

I enjoyed every page and was happy to see there’s going to be another featuring Esther Penman released sometime late 2023.

The Publishers Gumph

Detective Sergeant Esther Penman is a mess. She drinks too much. She sleeps around. And now her chief inspector is threatening to kick her out of CID and send her back to uniform because he doesn’t like her attitude.

Luckily for Esther, if there’s one thing she’s good at, it’s solving cases…

When a woman is killed in one of Belfield’s wealthiest neighbourhoods, Esther quickly realises that it’s no straightforward homicide. The husband has an alibi, but he’s hiding something, and Esther is determined to find out what.

A few days later a man is found hanging in nearby woodland, and her suspicions of a deeper conspiracy begin to grow.

It isn’t long before Esther’s discoveries set her on the trail of forces far more sinister than she imagined…

And put her on a collision course with the man they call the Art Merchant…

Pages: 285. Publisher: Chingola Publishing

The Misper. Kate London

A new author to me and I’m not surprised to find out that she has experience as a Met Detective.

This story is as real as it comes. The aftermath of the killing of a Police Officer.

The life of a Roadman and the effects on his psychological health, and that of his “family”

The story of how Ryan Kennedy ended up getting involved in gangs. How that escalated to him carrying drugs and blades, and ultimately a gun.

The probability that if you carry a weapon you will put yourself in a position where you brandish it, and eventually use it.

The frustrations of the Police when the vagaries of the law, the distinctions between murder and manslaughter, the proof of intention the “ mens rea” means a young cop killer gets off relatively lightly

The celebrity that the young cop killer has in prison, balanced against the fact he is a frightened 15 year old boy who knows his only way of surviving is to keep his mouth shut.

The effects of the mental health of the police officers involved in the operation in which the undercover detective died.

The blame culture balanced against the arrogance of those who think it wasn’t their fault.

The surviving widow with the young child.

All of this in the first quarter of the book, and it really sets the atmosphere of the story

The Publishing Gumph

When Ryan Kennedy is imprisoned after killing a police officer, he knows what he has to do. Keep his mouth shut about who he was working for, keep his head down, and rely on his youth to keep his sentence short. When he gets out, he’ll be looked after.

Following the death in the line of duty of a fellow detective, DI Sarah Collins has left the capital for a quieter life in the countryside. But when a missing teenager turns up on her patch, she finds herself drawn into a much bigger investigation – one that leads her right back to London, back to the Met, and back to Ryan Kennedy, the kid who killed a cop.

This powerful novel from a former Met detective explores the devastation that organized drug-running gangs can wreak on young lives. It asks who deserves to be saved – and whether saving them is even possible…

Publisher Corvus. Publishing Date : 3rd August 2023