Two Heads Are Better Than One

I just had to stay awake last night to finish this book.

It was quite a quick and easy read I whizzed through in a few sittings. There are only a handful of characters so it is easy to follow.

We begin with serial killer Brody evading capture from the police and finding a derelict boarded up house to hide in. He has a look around and finds a filthy mattress to sleep on whilst he decides what to do next. Bored, he sees the trap door to the attic and goes up for a look around. He is thrilled to see he can access the attics of 4 of the houses in the terrace.

Hungry and thirsty, he goes into each of the houses to find food, and to look for his next victims.

He becomes obsessed with a young couple who live in one on the houses. He can see them in their bedroom through a hole in the ceiling. He decides they will be next but he has to wait until the time is just right. He prides himself in being able to wait and build up the excitement. When they go to work he begins to toy with them by moving objects and making them start to have doubts about each other. He finds out secrets about them which he intends to make them tell each other just before he kills them.

How long can he wait?

The story is all told from Brodie’s point of view, plus there is a conversation going on with the voice in his head. We get to know about Brodie’s background and what turned him into a killer.

Once I got into this book I was hooked but it was not one which had me from the first chapter.

Thank you to NetGalley and Serpent’s Tail / Profile Books. I received a free review copy from the publisher in exchange for my honest unedited feedback.

Wow! I love a book that has me hooked right from the beginning and this one ticked that box! I read it in 2 days. What an extremely well written debut. I will be reading more from this author.

Paul returns from work to find his house in darkness and his front door open. He finds his wife, Alice, huddled on their bed, covered in blood, and a dead man in the bathroom holding a piece of wire. Alice has killed him.

Alice is in shock so Paul has to take the decision of what to do next. As a judge, he knows what would happen if the police got involved so he decides to dispose of the body and clean the house to get rid of any evidence. They have no idea who the man is or why he came to murder Alice.

Alice becomes more and more depressed and paranoid as time goes on, finding it increasingly difficult to live with what they have done. She begins to suspect her husband is having an affair.

The police come calling about what appears to be an unrelated case, the murders of three other solicitors who may have had a connection to Paul.

Can their marriage survive such a huge lie?

Many thanks to NetGalley and Orion for a free copy in return for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Books for a free copy of the book in return for an honest review. Published 28th May 2020.

Poppy Page has a fairly comfortable life. Her husband is a dentist and she has 2 daughters. She failed to be an actress so set up an agency providing extras for the tv and film industry. It is at an evening event for the industry she bumps into Matthew, the love of her life, who dumped her to marry her friend. Meeting Matthew again starts a chain of events which could end her marriage and ruin her life as he becomes obsessed with her.

Poppy’s mother in law, Betty, lives with Poppy and her family and helps with the housework and looking after the girls while Poppy and Stuart work. She is a very fit and outgoing 70 year old.

Poppy is the daughter Betty never had. Poppy thinks Betty had the perfect marriage, but that is far from the truth.

The story is told in alternating first person narrative both from Poppy and also very cleverly in letters to Poppy from Betty. Betty’s letters explain what a difficult life she had with her controlling and abusive husband, and of a dark secret.

And add another layer to the mix, the trial for Matthew’s murder. This runs throughout the book.

There are plenty of twists and turns to keep you glued from the first page right to the last.

This is not the first, and will not be the last Jane Corry book I read. This lady can tell a story! Highly recommend.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Trapeze Books Orion Publishing for a review copy of this book which is now available to purchase.

Felicity is based on a remote island near the Falklands, studying glaciers. We join her when she is very concerned about a cruise ship arriving, the last of the season before the islands are left to the scientists. She is desperate to check the passenger list to see if her husband, Freddie, has found her. She has taken this job in an attempt to get as far away from him as possible and in the hope he will not track her down following his release from prison for murder. Unfortunately she sees his name on the passenger list and makes her escape to a remote and unoccupied island which was once a whaling station, leaving false clues that she has gone to another island. Freddie sneaks into her bedroom and finds the clues but realises they are trying to lead him away from her actual destination and then sets out to find her.

Then we are taken back in time by 9 months to Felicity living in Cambridge. She is having issues with her mental health, losing hours at a time where she has no recollection of where she has been or what she has done. She finds items in her home she thinks have been moved and feels someone has been watching her.

She makes an appointment to see Joe, a very pleasant psychologist who has his own issues. He is recently back to work following a stressful incident in his life involving a murder of a homeless girl. Felicity needs a clean bill of health in order to take up a new job studying glaciers in a remote part of the world and needs to sort out her issues. Can Joe help her in the few weeks she has and issue that letter she desperately needs confirming her mental state is solid enough to endure this remote work?

Joe’s mum is a great character; she is a police officer with pink hair and a good appetite who is involved in the murder case. She is a good support for Joe and they work together on the case.

As we get to know the characters, more and more details emerge of what has brought them to this point in their lives.

A very well written book I was on the edge of my seat at the end. The author must have done some serious homework on glaciers as we are given a fantastic amount of detail on how they are made up, how they move and how very dangerous they are. A race up a glacier towards the end, without giving away any spoilers, is breathtaking.

I have more books by this author which I am looking forward to reading now. This is the first of hers I have read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Point Blank, OneWorld Publications for a copy of this book in return for an honest review.

Dark Pines is the third outing for Tuva Moodyson.

This time, her best friend Tammy has gone missing, apparently forcefully abducted from the food van she runs. Blood has been found in the van along with Tammy’s handbag.

Tuva rushes back to the scene of the abduction, to the small town of Gavrik where she used to live, deep in the Swedish forest. The police do not initially think it is a crime so Tuva begins investigating alone. Then another local girl goes missing.

Tuva visits some very strange characters in the course of her investigation, some she has met previously – the shoe shop owner who has an unhealthy obsession with feet and foot binding; the wood carving sisters who carve trolls and add pieces of human hair and nails to their sculptures; the ‘cousins’ who are uncannily close and run a business converting shipping containers into useable rooms; the snake breeder. That’s just to mention a few!

Will Dean’s excellent descriptive writing has you there, right in the middle of that forest!

Very enjoyable read.

What a storyline!

Kept me up until well after my bedtime so I could finish it last night (this morning!!)

Adam wakes up after a heavy drinking session in the house he is house sitting with his girlfriend Ruth to find she is missing. They met the owners of the house, who had gone on a retreat, on a cruise earlier in the year.

He searches the house, contacts her friends and work colleagues, but no one has seen or heard from her. The girl who was staying with them for a few days, Eden, who appeared on their doorstep one day in the pouring rain saying she came for a surprise visit to see the owners, has also vanished. As has the only photo of Eden which Adam had on his phone.

This is the worst hangover Adam has ever suffered.

The police don’t take Ruth’s going missing seriously but Adam knows she would not just up and leave her life and her acting career behind. Although he can’t remember what happened last night because of the alcohol.

So begins his search which leads him to believe Eden is the member of a cult.

What a page turner! I read this in just 2 days. Mark Edwards is up there with my favourite authors.

Thank you to NetGalley and HQ for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When Siobhan’s husband is arrested for a murder during their family holiday in France her world comes crumbling down. She thought his days of having affairs were behind them, but the murder he is accused of is a girl he had recently been seeing.

Their 16 year old daughter, Emma, is distraught. She had a close bond with her dad; much closer than with her mum which Siobhan envies.

There is also a baby missing, taken from the murdered girl’s flat. She had been babysitting for a friend.

I enjoyed the way the story was told by many of the characters involved in the murder and kidnap, covering the period leading up to the event and also since the event.

Kept me guessing until the final reveal!

Thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture for an advance copy of this book. Published 20th May 2020.

Alice’s life is spiralling downwards. She has lost her teaching job and her partner has left her. She is alone in her house without any friends and she just can’t be bothered to do anything.

Then out if the blue she received a text from her old best friend Joanna who she has not seen for over 10 years to let Alice know she is getting married. On a whim Alice offers to visit her, hoping this is just what she needs to help her out if her depression – a trip to see her best friend.

She jumps into her car a few days later. She arrives at Joanna’s new apartment but only her fiancé, Mark, is at home. Surprised her friend is not there to meet her she asks if it is ok for her to come in for a drink after her stressful drive into London.

Mark was unaware of Alice’s visit, and in fact Joanna has never even mentioned her old best friend to him. He tells her Joanna is on a weekend course but invites Alice to stay for her return.

From then on this twisty psychological thriller delves into the past of the girl’s relationship, and the personality weakness and phobias Alice suffers.

It is obvious there is a rabbit away, but as we get to know more of the strange characters living in this nearly empty apartment block it does not get any easier to predict the end.

It was an enjoyable read and I would certainly read more from this author.

I received a free review copy from the publisher in exchange for my honest unedited feedback.

Thank you to NetGalley and Serpent’s Tail, Viper and Profile.

A school reunion. 20 years after leaving school. An updated yearbook. I’m sure those of us who left school a fair number of years ago will relate to this book. How interesting it would be to see how the ‘popular’ girls and boys had fared in life since school. Have the quiet ones come out if their shells and blossomed?

Kate was one of the quiet ones. It was her idea to track down her classmates and show them she was now successful. She manages to find most of them but a few are harder to find including Robbie, who’s entry in the yearbook left no doubt he had no good memories of school whatsoever.

Kate asks for updates to the yearbook so she can have a new one printed. Letters and emails start appearing with ‘updates’ on their lives they would rather not share, but who has sent them? Who else could possibly know such intimate details of their lives?

When one of the group is attacked and ends up in hospital in a bad state, they wonder if this attack was carried out by the same person who has been sending the emails and letters. Who could have such a serious grudge against them all?

The characters in the book are well written and we get to know most of them in depth. I guess most readers will relate to at least one of them.

The book was enjoyable although not quite in the ‘I couldn’t put it down’ category. I was gripped towards the end where the pace picked up and the culprit was revealed.

Thank you to Boldwood Books and NetGalley for allowing me to read an advance copy of this book in return for an honest review. Publication date 5/5/2020

Libby Quinn grew up listening to her beloved grandfathers stories. Once he began with ‘Once upon a time…’ she was so excited to hear where this story would take her. Her love of books had begun. Her grandfather always told her how amazing it would be to own a book shop.

After her grandfather dies, Libby decides she must follow her heart and open up her own bookshop in memory of her grandfather. She finds a run down, rat infested shop for sale on Ivy Street and decides this is the one. After she picks up the keys she finds it is in a worse condition than she initially thought.

Her boyfriend, Ant, is reluctant to get his hands dirty to help her and she has doubts about their relationship. Especially when she gets to know Noah, who runs the pub across the street.

Will she meet her target of 10 weeks to opening?

This is a lovely feel good book. Who doesn’t dream of owning their own bookshop?!

I would recommend this for fans of Lucy Diamond, and anyone who wants an uplifting read.