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THE DARE BY CAROL WYER (NATALIE WARD 3)

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Synopsis: When thirteen-year-old Savannah Hopkins doesn’t come straight home from school as she always does, her mother Jane immediately raises the alarm. With her blonde ponytail and red school jumper, someone must have spotted Savannah.

Detective Natalie Ward is determined to help the distraught mother – her own daughter is the same age as Savannah. But before Natalie and her team can get started, their worst fears are confirmed when the teenager’s broken body is found in nearby shrubland.

Evidence points towards a local recluse, but just as Natalie closes the net around him, one of Savannah’s friends, Harriet, is reported missing. Harriet might look grown up and sophisticated but she is only fourteen…

As Natalie delves into the lives of both girls, she soon discovers a sinister video on both their phones, daring the girls to disappear from their families for 48 hours. She’s sure this is the key to the case, but before she can act, Harriet’s body is found discarded on a roadside.

Natalie’s superiors don’t have to put any extra pressure on her. Devastated, she and her team work without sleep, watching that video over and over. But just as she thinks they’re getting close, the person Natalie loves more than anything goes missing.

Natalie is no stranger to loss. She is terrified and the clock is ticking. Can she push through her fear to catch this depraved killer, before her loved one becomes the next victim?

Rated: 4/5

My Review: Because I went straight from book 2 on to book 3 no introduction was needed and I was keen to see what the gang were up to now. Of course another time and another murder investigation! This however seems to be only the tip of the iceberg as another girl goes missing. What makes this whole scenario even worse is that our lead character Natalie has a daughter the same age as these girls that are being found murdered and going missing.

There is an added element to this latest story as the reader experiences flashbacks from the killer which makes you wonder who this person is. Once again we also get to see a little more of the team and their personal lives. On the flip side of the work, Natalie’s home life is becoming more fraught as her marriage is under serious strain. I cannot say I am disappointed as I absolutely loathe David as a character and think Natalie needs to move on from him.

Overall, another brilliant read and once again this made me want to continue reading about everybody so straight onto the next book I go!!!

LAST LULLABY BY CAROL WYER (NATALIE WARD 2)

42510908 Synopsis: Charlotte’s baby is safe. But is she?

When the body of young mother Charlotte Brannon is discovered by her husband in their immaculate, silver bedroom, Detective Natalie Ward is first on the scene. The killer has left a chilling calling card: the word ‘Why?’ written on the wall in blood.

Determined to find justice, Natalie quickly discovers the husband is hiding a troubled past, and she’s sure the teenage babysitter’s alibi doesn’t quite add up.

But before Natalie can dig deeper, another mother is murdered, her young son left distraught, staring at a fresh ‘who’scrawled beside her.

Natalie knows it’s only a matter of time before the killer strikes again, but all the key suspects have alibis. It’s her toughest case yet, and with her marriage hanging by a thread, the cracks are beginning to show.

Just when Natalie finds an unsettling clue she thinks could solve the case, another young woman and her baby disappear, and a member of Natalie’s team is put in terrible danger.

Can Natalie stop this twisted killer and save one of her own before more families are torn apart forever?

Rated: 4/5

My Review: It’s been a long time since I read the first book in this series but starting at book 2 after so long made no difference. This small but mighty team of coppers comprise Natalie, Lucy, Ian and Murray. They are faced with solving the murder of a young mother Charlotte Brannon. It’s a grisly scene and even more disturbing is the writing on the wall and the fact that her young baby is perfectly unharmed in the other room.

This book got me straight back into this small team and really get a feel for all of the individual characters. The storyline surrounding the murder is well plotted and fast paced and certainly kept me interested. I also loved the fact that we got to see into Natalie’s personal life and I have to be honest and say I loathe her husband David. I read this in a few days and thoroughly enjoyed it. So much so that I decided to continue my binge read of this series and totally catch up.

I still believe that the Robyn Carter series has the edge over this one as I absolutely LOVE that series but think this could become just as good given time!

FATAL WITNESS BY ROBERT BRYNDZA (ERIKA FOSTER 7)

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Synopsis: How do you find a killer who has destroyed all the evidence?

Detective Erika Foster is on a late-night walk near her new house in Blackheath when she stumbles upon the brutal murder of Vicky Clarke, a true-crime podcaster.

Erika is assigned to the case and discovers that Vicky had been working on a new podcast episode about a sexual predator who preys on young female students around South London, staking out his victims in their halls of residence before breaking in at the dead of night.

When Erika discovers that Vicky’s notes and sound recordings were stolen from her flat at the time of her murder, it leads her to believe that Vicky was close to unmasking the attacker, and she was killed to guarantee her silence.

The case takes on a disturbing twist when the body of a young Bulgarian student doctor is discovered in the same building, and this makes Erika question everything she thought she knew about Vicky. With very little evidence, the clock is ticking to find the killer before he strikes again.

My Rating : 4/5

Review: Erika has moved into her new home in Blackheath and as she takes a stroll one evening she hears a bloodcurdling scream. When she arrives at where the sound is coming from she is confronted with a horrific murder scene and instantly calls in her team. Vicky Clarke, a true-crime podcaster has been murdered and found by her sister. It turns out that Vicky has been investigating a series of historical sexual crimes and Erika suspects she may have got too close.

The story unfolds in a number of ways and there area number of threads running through the story which keep it very interesting. It’s also very well paced meaning I managed to read the book in pretty much three straight sittings. The one thing I loved about this latest book is the foray into Erika’s personal life and it’s great to see some developments there. I can only hope we continue to see that going forward in future books. Another great read in this series.

DEADLY SECRETS BY ROBERT BRYNDZA (ERIKA FOSTER 6)

Deadly Secrets

Synopsis: Synopsis: On an icy morning, a mother wakes to find her daughter’s blood-soaked body frozen to the road. Who would carry out such a killing on the victim’s doorstep?

Straight off her last harrowing case, Detective Erika Foster is feeling fragile but determined to lead the investigation. As she sets to work, she finds reports of assaults in the same quiet South London suburb where the woman was killed. One chilling detail links them to the murder victim – they were all attacked by a figure in black wearing a gas mask.

Erika is on the hunt for a killer with a terrifying calling card. The case gets more complicated when she uncovers a tangled web of secrets surrounding the death of the beautiful young woman.

Yet just as Erika begins to piece the clues together, she is forced to confront painful memories of her past. Erika must dig deep, stay focused and find the killer. Only this time, one of her own is in terrible danger…

My Rating : 4/5

Review: It’s been a LONG time since I last read this series and decided it was high time I got back to it. As soon as I started and was a mere two chapters in it was like I had never been away. Erika is her same bristly self and we start by seeing her attending a scene instead of attending a Christmas Dinner. On the icy December morning a woman’s blood-soaked body is found frozen just steps from her own front door. The victim Marissa is found by her mother Mandy and the scene is not a pleasant one.

Marissa was only in her twenties and was a burlesque dancer, but one with what soon shows is many secrets. In addition to the murder there have been reports in the area of people getting attacked by a person dressed in black wearing a gas mask. Erika and her team have their work cut out for them as they try to unravel some of Marissa’s secrets and try to work out who the killer is.

Although we are now into book 6 in the series it still feels like a solid series with lots of life in it. I am glad I have revisited this series after so long away and will eagerly move onto book 7

DEADLY FATE BY ANGELA MARSONS (KIM STONE 18)

Deadly Fate 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…SYNOPSIS: When a nineteen-year-old boy, Jamie Mills, is found hanging from a tree in a local park, his death is ruled a suicide. Detective Kim Stone’s instincts tell her something isn’t right. Why, when his mother is told, does she not break down in tears? And how could Jamie have climbed the tree with a recent injury?

Kim should be easing back into work gently after a harrowing case left her body and mind broken, but quickly taking charge of her team, Kim is shocked to learn that Jamie’s parents had sent him to a clinic to ‘cure’ him of his sexuality.

The clues to smashing open this disturbing case lie behind the old Victorian walls of the clinic, run by the Gardner family. They claim that patients come of their own accord and are free to leave at any time. But why are those who attended the clinic so afraid to speak of what happens there? And where did the faded restraint marks on Jamie’s wrists come from?

Kim makes a further chilling discovery – the head of the clinic, Celia Gardner, was sent there for conversion therapy when she was sixteen.

Then the body of a young woman is found dead by suffocation, her death also staged to look like a suicide.

Scarred from a previous case that nearly took her life, can Kim unearth the dark secrets within the Gardner family and is she strong enough to stop a terrifying killer silencing the clinic’s previous patients one by one?

Kat’s Rating: 5/5

My Review: Back with the team that Kim Stone runs is like going back home for a visit. Bryant her ever solid right hand man, Penn and Stacey and a murder case takes us right back into the heart of their lives. Sandra Deakin is found dead in a horrific manner and the team learn that she was a reasonably well known psychic. They need to work out if her job played apart in her death, and who would commit such a horrendous attack.

The fact that the murder victim was a psychic plays a key part in this book and it unravels a lot of personal feelings among the team as they each try to determine their personal views on psychics. In addition to the first murder, Kim also wants to learn more about the death of the homeless John Doe. Stacey ends up running a lot of background for the Sandy murder and in turn ends up crossing paths with somebody that I think her life difficult!

The team work tirelessly and as usual they end up with a result, and not one I entirely saw coming. As usual these books are so well plotted, packed full of threads and characters that you love. I am thrilled that this series shows no signs of slowing down even after book 18! I particularly liked the ending of this book and cannot wait to see how things pan out in the next one.

IN COLD BLOOD BY CAROLINE MITCHELL (DI AMY WINTER 5)

In Cold Blood Synopsis: DI Amy Winter faces her toughest case yet as a serial killer couple kidnap and hunt their prey. After capture, the victims are released from an unknown location each day. But freedom does not come easily as the victim’s injuries become more severe, and if they haven’t escaped by day four, they won’t live to see the fifth.

At five months pregnant, Amy is feeling backed into a corner as the father of her child, DCI Donovan, urges her to share the news. But Amy doesn’t want to be treated differently by her team, much less lose their respect when they discover she’s in a relationship with her DCI. When a call comes in from the killer asking to meet Amy, Donovan intercepts and sends a decoy in her place. But while officers are concentrating on the decoy, Amy is kidnapped from outside her home. She is the next victim, and the countdown begins.

After being bundled into the back of a van and driven to a desolate woodland, Amy’s heart sinks in her chest as she realises the killers have no intention of playing fair.

DCI Donovan is distraught as he discovers Amy is missing. When his team receives a taunting video, he is left in no doubt of the danger Amy and his unborn child are in. He must pull himself together to hunt the killer down. But with no clues and no location, there is only one person with intimate knowledge of how a killer’s mind works. Lillian Grimes – Amy’s serial killer mother. But can he persuade her to help him in time? As the days progress, Amy’s injuries grow more severe, and her team are locked in a desperate race against time.

Kat’s Rating: 5/5

My Review: DI Amy Winter faces her toughest case yet as a serial killer couple kidnap and hunt their prey. After capture, the victims are released from an unknown location each day. But freedom does not come easily as the victim’s injuries become more severe, and if they haven’t escaped by day four, they won’t live to see the fifth.

After being bundled into the back of a van and driven to a desolate woodland, Amy’s heart sinks in her chest as she realises the killers have no intention of playing fair.

FLESH AND BLOOD BY CAROLINE MITCHELL (DI AMY WINTER 4)

Flesh & Blood Synopsis:

A string of suicides. A community in terror. And a chilling conspiracy only DI Amy Winter can crack.

A wave of apparent suicides hits a string of seaside resorts, but when a police officer is named as the latest to die, DI Amy Winter suspects there may be more than mere coincidence to these tragic deaths. But what dark motive could cause someone to throw themselves into the cold depths of the North Sea?

Someone in the community knows more than they are letting on, but Amy’s questions are met with resistance. A group of mysterious teenagers might hold the key, but why are they so afraid to talk? Meanwhile, after the release from prison of her serial killer mother, Amy is fighting her own demons.

In her toughest investigation yet, Amy must confront her dark past if she is to put an end to the carnage. What secret is so terrible that it’s worth killing a police officer for? Amy needs to find the answer, before the sea washes up any more bodies.

Kat’s Rating: 4/5

My Review: I was pleased to be back with Amy and her team in this book which is number 4 in the series. DI Donovan is still in charge and when a string of suicides goes on at a seaside resort the team don’t have the first clue they were even happening. That is until DI Donovans old colleague Carla becomes another suspected suicide. The whole team relocate down to the coast in the hope they can help DI Donovan’s old team to get to the bottom of what happened to DC Burke.

There are a few threads running through the storyline one of which is a group of teenagers that seemed to be linked to graffiti found at each scene of the supposed suicide. Amy and DI Donovan know that these supposed suicides are way more than they seem and it becomes clear that the more they dig, the more they find. It was great to see a little more of Amy’s team such as Molly Baxter and to get a little more of her backstory.

I thoroughly enjoyed this latest book and will happily move onto book 5 of the series named In Cold Blood

INVISIBLE VICTIM BY MEL SHERRATT

Invisible Victim Synopsis: ‘Let me out! Please!’ I shouted, banging on the door. How had I got here? What day was it? I couldn’t remember anything. But I knew I had become the fifth woman to be abducted.

As my eyes adjust to the darkness, I’m filled with dread. Everything looks just like the others described: a small hole in the door, a mattress and a narrow window allowing only a small chink of light. The jewellery given to me by my loving husband has gone and I’m in someone else’s clothes.

Just days before, I had interviewed the third victim for the local paper. She couldn’t stop shaking. Her story was the same as those before her: an ordinary woman, locked away for ten days then released with no explanation, and nothing – nothing she could think of – to link her to the others. Throughout the ordeal, her abductor stayed eerily silent.

I tell myself I’ll be safe in ten days. But I can’t help thinking of the fourth victim who is still missing. And then I hear the voice coming through the door. ‘You said everything would be fine. But it wasn’t was it?’ It is then that I realise. If I am to make it out alive, I need to revisit a dark secret of my own that I have spent a lifetime trying to forget.

Kat’s Rating: 4/5

My Review: It’s been a while since I read a Mel Sherratt and thought I would break up a series I am reading with a standalone and this seemed to fit the bill. Eva Farmer is a journalist who absolutely loves her work. Recently she has been covering the cases of women being snatched and then released after ten days. There seems to be no common links and none of the victims can seem to shed any light on the person responsible.

Early on in the book we get an idea of Eva’s personal life with her police husband Nick and her life seems just ordinary. It’s clear she has compassion for victims and her newspaper pieces tend to be very fair and balanced. When Eva herself is taken she has absolutely no ide why and more to the point what will happen to her. I must admit I felt like this was a bit of a departure from other Mel Sherratt books I have read, however that isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy it, just to note that it is slightly set apart from her other style of books.

LEFT FOR DEAD BY CAROLINE MITCHELL (DI AMY WINTER 3)

Left For Dead Synopsis: A victim on display. A detective on the rails.

Shopping with her sister, DI Amy Winter is admiring a Valentine’s Day window display of a perfect bride encrusted in diamonds and resplendent in lace—until she notices blood oozing from the mannequin’s mouth.

This is no stunt. A post-mortem reveals the victim was left to die on her macabre throne for all to see. When a second victim is found, it emerges that both women were ‘Sugar Babes’ arranging dates with older men online—and Amy finds herself hunting an accomplished psychopath.

As she tracks down the killer, Amy’s instincts go into overdrive when the charismatic head of the agency behind the display makes no attempt to hide his fascination with her serial-killer parents. What exactly does he want from Amy? With her own world in freefall as her biological mother, Lillian Grimes, appeals her conviction, Amy pushes the boundaries of police procedure when a third ‘Sugar Babe’ disappears…Is she as much at risk as the killer’s victims?

My Rating: 5/5

My Review: I started this series and have read books 1 and 2 back to back going straight onto book 3. This book was just as good as the last and I read this in a day and a half it was that good. Every opportunity was spent sneaking a few pages in until such time as I could actually sit and read a big chunk. While Amy is spending some time shopping with her sister she comes across a macabre window display and as she looks closer and realises that the ‘model’ is in fact a murder victim. All hell breaks loose and before you know it Amy and the team are working on this newest case.

The difference with this book is that we know who the killer is early on but that makes not one bit of difference to the story. If anything it amps up the drama and intrigue. We see Amy continue down a strange path with her mother the serial killer Lillian Grimes, as well as coming to terms with new working arrangements. DI Donovan is now her Boss and with her foot in both professional and personal camps where he is concerned she struggles to adapt.

This latest instalment flowed very well with lots packed into a book that flew by. This series is absolutely brilliant so far and I hope I continue enjoying the books as much as I have so far!

THE SECRET CHILD BY CAROLINE MITCHELL (DI AMY WINTER 2)

THE SECRET CHILD Synopsis:

DI Amy Winter knows evil. She’s lived through it.

Four-year-old Ellen is snatched by a stranger in the dead of night. Her devastated mother, Nicole, receives four identical phials and a threatening note in a familiar scrawl that chills her to the bone. But she always knew this would happen. She’s been expecting it for years . . .

According to the note, one of the phials is poisoned. Nicole is given a deadly challenge: if she drinks one, the sadistic kidnapper will notify the police of Ellen’s location. The sender claims to be Luka Volkov but Luka is supposed to be dead, killed long ago in a fire that haunts all those involved.

DI Amy Winter is still reeling from the discovery that she is the daughter of a serial killer, and her childhood trauma only makes her more determined to bring Ellen home. When another child is taken, Amy finds herself in a race against time. To rescue the children, must she seek help from the one person she wants to forget?

Kat’s Rating: 5/5

Kat’s Review: I am always pleased when I finally catch up with an author I like to find they have an amazing new series and Caroline Mitchell is one such author! Thsi new series featuring Amy Winter I thoroughly loved the first book and was pleased to be able to move straight onto book 2. This latest installment features a missing 4 year old Ellen. What I love about this series is Amy Winter’s background is far from ordinary. She realised in book 1 that she was the daughter of an infamous serial killer couple and has had to deal with the trauma surrounding her childhood.

Thankfully it seems that she uses this to her advantage and has a knack of spotting people that are slightly ‘dark’. There are plenty of people playing various roles within this dark and shady storyline and it takes some time to work out who has played what part but as each element is revealed it becomes clearer for the reader to see where this story could go. I found myself totally absorbed in the storyline and love the fact that we still get to see elements of Amy’s relationship with her deranged biological Mother.

This series is turning out to be pretty amazing and I am pleased that I still have a few books left in the series to become caught up. Definitely a great series to read and I would definitely reccomend!