Chloe is trying to balance her job as a newspaper archivist with looking after her nan, her only family, who has dementia.
When her nan is put into a home for her own safety, Chloe becomes obsessed with a case she found in the archives about a 4 year old girl who went missing 25 years ago. She makes it her goal to solve the case, even managing to lodge in a room with the parents who are still hoping their daughter will return one day.
Although the main plot line is the missing girl, to me the book was more about personal struggles, relationships and dealing with heartbreaking tragedy.
I anticipated the end would be predictable but I was pleasantly surprised with the extremely well thought out conclusion.
Thank you to NetGalley and PanMacmillan for a copy to review. 4/5 stars from me 😁
I enjoyed Nikki’s debut, All In Her Head, so jumped at the chance to read and review an advance copy of her second book.
Again, Nikki has written about difficult domestic situations realistically and sensitively.
Jo and Caroline are sisters. They have never been close, always competing for their parents love. Their father has just died bringing them together for the funeral and to sort out their fathers estate. 70% of the family business is now owned by Jo which has not gone down too well and she is under pressure to sell it.
It looks from the outside that the sisters have happy comfortable lives, but no-one knows what goes on behind closed doors. Caroline is married to the most hideous man who abuses her both physically and mentally. She has hidden this from everyone apart from her 19 year old son who has gone travelling to Bali to get away from his father. Jo suspects her husband is facing an affair, and one of her young daughters seems particularly affected by her grandfathers death.
The story is told from the points of view of Jo and Caroline but we also have a third, unknown narrator who keeps popping up to discuss their feelings for someone.
Great thriller I devoured in a few sittings. Nikki has quickly become one of my must read authors.
Thank you to Orion Publishing Group and NetGalley for an advance copy to review. Book published 1/4/21
When I was given the opportunity to read an advance copy of this book I jumped at the chance.
Having read the previous book in the series, Plague, a political murder mystery set around Westminster and in the underground tunnels of London I was very keen to catch up with Cassie Fortune after her traumatic experience (no spoilers!)
Julie has chosen another extremely interesting setting for this book – the area in and around the Temple of Apollo at Delphi.
We catch up with Cassie just a short while after the first book. She is now working for the new PM and has been sent as his envoy to speak at a conference with the purpose of convincing the Greek PM to visit London for an off the record meeting.
Whilst there, a local woman is murdered and then one of the delegates disappears. Cassie is made to assist with the investigations.
The story is vividly brought to life by the descriptions of the area, the weather and even the chamber below the temple Cassie falls into on a night of particularly bad weather. And those hallucinations. Or are they?
I enjoy Julie’s writing. Although initially I thought I was going to struggle with the number of Greek names and characters, this is soon dwindled down to just a handful of the important characters. There is no unnecessary padding and I also appreciated the fact that the main events are summed up along the story to keep us on track. Plenty of twists and turns and revelations you will never guess!
A really good read which I have enjoyed over Easter weekend and now I’m looking forward to the next instalment.
Due to be published by Claret Press on 5th May 2021.
I saw a lot of hype about this book on Twitter and requested an early review copy from NetGalley and I am so glad I did! What a debut. I finished it last night just before publication day today. It is a slow burn but once you get into it and get to know the extremely deep and well developed characters it is totally absorbing.
The story revolves around the disappearance of 17 year old Abigail one night after a party at the Tall Bones which is a group of tall white stones in the forest. Abi tells her friend Emma she is meeting someone in the woods and reluctantly Emma leaves her. She will regret that decision. Abi is not seen again after that night.
Emma turns to alcohol to help her cope and decides to try and uncover what happened to Abi that night with the help of Rat, a Romanian boy living in the trailer park and Maddox, a friend of Abi’s and Noah, one of Abi’s brothers.
Secrets start being uncovered and the town are looking for someone to blame. The teenagers are going through their own issues and have nowhere to turn for help. Parents are either abusive or just don’t care, and the pastor puts the blame for their thoughts and worries back on them, telling them they are broken. The same pastor who blames Abi’s mother for her own abuse by her crazy husband Samuel, a Vietnam war vet who clearly has PTSD and drives his wife to the verge of insanity where she stops functioning.
As we get to know the people who live in this small town of Whistling Ridge we find a horrible cruel lot of weak minded people, who have the local church at the centre of their lives, and are brainwashed by the pastor. They are homophobes, racists, wife beaters, child abusers. They use the bible as the excuse for their behaviour, confused by the bible’s message by the preacher of hatred. No wonder the teenagers can’t wait to get away from the town.
Things come to a head one night after a particularly savage church meeting which ends with the setting fire to a property.
At least one person knows what happened to Abi that night.
Thanks very much to NetGalley and Transworld Penguin Random House for the chance to read an ARC of this book.
Another addictive thriller from the extremely talented Fiona Cummins. Having read Rattle and The Bone Collector I knew I was in for a brilliant read and I was not disappointed.
This story is told over a dual timeline with the current timeline first, then we are taken back to what happened when the children were 10 and 12 years old and one of them murdered their parents. We find out what the girls had to endure and what events led up to that night. The girls had an extremely strong bond.
We have two narrators one is the girl next door and the other is one of the sisters who is now living under a new identity with her husband and daughter who know nothing of her old life. Until her sister films an interview and the press track her down.
Fiona delves in to various difficult topics, the main one being child abuse of two young sisters by their ‘disciplinarian’ parents who are respected members of the community. The father is a doctor and the mother is a stay at home mum who knits blankets for babies. No one knows what goes on behind closed doors. The parents are brutally murdered one night and the two daughters are taken into care. One of the girls is covered in blood and appears to be the murderer.
Their friend who lives next door has a mother who is dying from cancer and a father who is having an affair. She knows what happened that night but is keeping a huge secret.
I raced through this book in a couple of days. Highly recommended.
thanks to Pan Macmillan and NetGalley for an advance copy to review. Due for publication 15 April 2021.
The book is inspired by a real life event in December 1900, where three lighthouse keepers vanished from their remote lighthouse in the Outer Hebrides. This book and it’s characters is, however, a work of fiction. The book has been very well researched and there are some real life accounts in there drawn from the author’s thorough research of life living in a lighthouse. I did love the authors nod to the original story by mentioning a tern which lives in the Outer Hebrides and I enjoyed getting to know what it is like to live on a lighthouse. Not for me at all.
This story is set on the Maiden lighthouse, 15 miles off Land’s End.
I loved the premise of the story which is almost a locked room mystery. When a relieving keeper is taken to the lighthouse, the crew find the steel door to the lighthouse locked from the inside. When they enter the tower, they find nothing is disturbed. The clocks have stopped at 8.45. The table is laid for only two people. Everything is spic and span, the way lighthouse keepers live.
The story is written along a dual timeline by multiple narrators. The 1972 story is written in chapters by the three men living and working on the lighthouse. We get to know the men, about their home lives, their secrets and their psychological state of mind, which goes downhill the longer they are on the lighthouse.
We also have a time line set 20 years later when an author decides he will write a book about the incident in his search for the truth. By interviewing the wives left behind he is opening up old wounds. Not all of those left behind are prepared to talk to the author This timeline has alternating chapters told by the wives.
As the book progresses we delve further into the lives of the keepers and the ones they left behind.
The descriptive writing, especially of the sea, is amazing.
I did find the story hard going as I felt I had to concentrate with all the different characters and their chapters and the intertwining of their stories, same stories from different viewpoints. The characters were not particularly likeable and I didn’t feel I got to know any of them particularly well. I’m also one of those readers where I find reading about animal cruelty horrific and there are a couple of scenes toward the end of the book I don’t feel were necessary.
I wasn’t sure whether the story had supernatural elements or if it was just all in the minds of the keepers.
Thank you to NetGalley and Picador for a review copy of this interesting debut.
Maya and her father, Stephen, live quietly in a house on the edge of a cliff. Maya’s mum died when she was only 6, having fallen from the cliff not far from their home. Maya possibly saw it happen but her memories of the event are very hazy.
Maya’s dad has protected her from what happened all of her life but now she is 19 she wants to know the truth. She feels like she is now looking after and protecting him. He has periods of depression where his mood darkens and he locks himself away in his bedroom.
Stephen is a psychologist and runs his own practice. Teresa works for him; she is a counsellor and has feelings for Stephen but doesn’t know how to tell him. Teresa has her own problems in her life – an abusive husband, a moody teenage son and a mother who lives alone but has dementia.
After 12 years of being a widower, Amy comes into Stephens life and very quickly moves herself in as coincidentally her tenancy is ending. Maya can’t believe what she sees. Amy is the image of her dead mother. With Amy’s arrival comes secrets, revelations and questions about the past.
What did happen the night Maya’s mother died?
A gripping and twisty storyline told mainly from the perspective of Amy and a second narrator of Teresa.
Phew what a journey that was! A dark and compelling snapshot of gang culture and the American criminal justice system, which can be both good and corrupt, following a gang shooting.
The book is written in a very interesting way of multiple first party narratives so we really get to know what the characters are thinking and feeling. From the gang members to the parole officers, police officers, lawyers … there must be around 15 characters we hear from to tell the story.
It begins with a crime ordered by a gang from within a prison for a dealer, Scrappy, to be shot.
‘Dreamer’ is in the process of being dumped by his girlfriend but he doesn’t realise this will actually benefit him immensely in the long run.
Augie who has just gained his latest fix from his dealer witnesses her shooting. His quick action in putting a tourniquet on her leg saves her life. He pockets the gun to sell later. And also take all the drugs she has hidden on her before the police arrive.
Unfortunately for him his new parole officer,Petrillo, visits his home and finding him high and therefore in contravention of his parole terms, searches his home. He finds the gun. Augie knows this will mean a long prison sentence so in a bid to avoid prison he tells Petrillo what he saw. The corrupt Petrillo uses this info for his own end, persuading Augie to lie about what he saw. Petrillo wants Dreamer’s girlfriend for himself and this seems like the perfect way to remove him from her life.
Gangs look after their own so how will this play out?
Gatiss writes some excellent scenes as we are carried along with the accused, the witnesses, the law enforcement officers, the lawyers and those gang members left on the outside to work out what actually happened that night.
I admit I struggled a bit to get into the book as it did not grip me immediately but the background info is essential to understand the story.
Thank you so much to NetGalley and the publishers Picador for an advance copy of this book to read and review.
I was expecting very good things from the author, as he is the creator of one of my favourite TV series, Death In Paradise. I was not disappointed! For me, the book had the same cosy feeling of watching one of the episodes, murder and humour.
Meet Judith Potts (great name!). 77 years old. She lives next to the Thames where she enjoys to swim. Naked! She also enjoys compiling cryptic crosswords for a newspaper. Her life is going tickety-boo until she hears a gunshot during one of her swims.
She contacts the police to report the fact she thinks her neighbour over the river has been shot but they don’t take her seriously, sending an officer to have a brief look around the house. She knows this as she watches from her window. So she decides she will investigate herself.
Two further murders follow and she enlists the help of two local ladies with connections to the other two victims to help her find the murderer.
What follows, along with the crazy antics of the three of them, is a close friendship and a trust which grows by the day.
I loved Judith so much and I hope this is the first of many books following her amateur sleuthing!
I love to read books set in old spooky buildings and this ticked that box perfectly! What a page turner!
After his first book reaches the New York Times bestseller list, Daniel and his wife Nicole decide they want to move to a big old house with character. After only 36 hours of searching online, Nicole finds the Nightingale House. This looks like the perfect house for them to move to with their young daughter, Caitlyn.
They went to view it immediately and decided there and then they would buy it.
Sadly Nicole was never to move in to the Nightingale House as she died in a car crash, with her husband driving the car.
Daniel and Caitlyn move in to the house, unaware the house has many hidden secrets. When Daniel hears his daughter whispering in her bedroom he thinks she has an imaginary friend.
Then he begins to see shadows and hear noises which have no explanation.
We are also given excerpts from a diary which was written over 100 years earlier about previous owners of the house.
This is not a book to be read before bedtime!
I loved it!
Thank you to HQ Digital and NetGalley for a free e copy of this fantastic book in return for an honest review.
Two Heads Are Better Than One 