Category: July – Sept 2019

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The Sleepwalker by Joseph Knox – Blog Tour Review.

About The Book

‘He said he didn’t remember killing them…’

As a series of rolling blackouts plunge the city into darkness, Detective Aidan Waits sits on an abandoned hospital ward, watching a mass murderer slowly die. Transferred from his usual night shift duties and onto protective custody, he has just one job…

To extract the location of Martin Wick’s final victim before the notorious mass murderer passes away.

Wick has spent over a decade in prison, in near-total silence, having confessed to an unspeakable crime that shocked the nation and earned him the nickname of The Sleepwalker.

But when a daring premeditated attack leaves one police officer dead and another one fighting for his life, Wick’s whispered last words will send Waits on a journey into the heart of darkness…

Manipulated by a reticent psychopath from his past, and under investigation from his new partner, Detective Constable Naomi Black, Waits realises too late that a remorseless contract killer is at work.

Can Aidan Waits solve his last case before fleeing justice?

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received. A few years ago I read and enjoyed Sirens, the first book in the Aidan Watts series. I was intrigued with the Manchester setting but wasn’t prepared for how dark the storyline was, how corrupt the police were and mainly how flawed Aidan was.

By book three much is the same, the darkness and corruption is still evident but I started to see a different side to Aidan. He seemed to accept, without resentment, the way his life had gone and I started to see a more compassionate side to him. I first noticed it when he met Adam in Strangeways prison. I felt that he was genuinely concerned for him and that he wanted to make his life more bearable. This feeling continued throughout the novel and on finishing it, I think it was because he was aware of what lay in his own future. A few days after reading it I feel that this was the first book I liked him in.

It was a nice change to have a police officer who wasn’t corrupt. Naomi, who became Aidan’s new partner early in the novel when Sutty was injured whilst on duty. I could sense her loyalty, despite the frustration she felt towards Aidan at times. Even when he hurt her feelings she didn’t abandon him. She was the only member of the force who I didn’t feel had a different agenda. I have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of her.

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The Closer I Get by Paul Burston – Blog Tour Review.

About The Book

Tom is a successful author, but he’s struggling to finish his novel. His main distraction is an online admirer, Evie, who simply won’t leave him alone.

Evie is smart, well read and unstable; she lives with her father and her social-media friendships are not only her escape, but everything she has.

When she’s hit with a restraining order, her world is turned upside down, and Tom is free to live his life again, to concentrate on writing.

But things aren’t really adding up. For Tom is distracted but also addicted to his online relationships, and when they take a darker, more menacing turn, he feels powerless to change things. Because maybe he needs Evie more than he’s letting on.

A compulsive, disturbingly relevant, twisty and powerful psychological thriller, The Closer I Get is also a searing commentary on the fragility and insincerity of online relationships, and the danger that can lurk just one ‘like’ away…

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received. The Closer I Get was a novel that I heard a lot about without really knowing it’s synopsis. That is, until I saw a link to an article in a newspaper article about what inspired the author to write it, which then inspired me to read the book as soon as I could.

Many people are on social media. Many post things that they wouldn’t say in real life, face to face. They get involved in disagreements that are best avoided, often using the hashtag. Some become stalkers. Evie is one of the few who do all of these things. There are probably many like her, a loner who had a terrible childhood and didn’t know how to be in the real world. There were moments where I could understand her pain but not how she dealt with it. After being served with a restraining order for her actions involving Tom they both have to rebuild the lives. But are things as they appear?

I found this story mesmerising. More so because neither of the two main characters were that likeable. I couldn’t work out if either of them were being honest and neither of them were nice to anybody they came into contact with. I did have sympathy for Tom initially but I also had misgivings when I could see the way he treated his friends and lovers. He was selfish and self obsessed and couldn’t see that his friend Emma may have needed him to be there for her, just like she was expected to be there for him. The only one who brought out his better side was his developing friendship with his elderly neighbour, Colin.

As well as the characters the author does a terrific job of describing the negative side to social media. One of the platforms in particular is shown at its worst and I’m probably not the only one who was left feeling ill at ease and reluctant to post anything at all.

Totally different to many of the novels that I read, I’m looking forward to my limited edition signed copy arriving soon.

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The Smiling Man by Joseph Knox – Review.

About The Book

Disconnected from his history and careless of his future, Detective Aidan Waits has resigned himself to the night shift: an endless cycle of meaningless emergency calls and lonely dead ends. 

Until he and his partner, Detective Inspector Peter ‘Sutty’ Sutcliffe, are summoned to the Palace, a vast disused hotel in the centre of a restless, simmering city. There they find the body of a man. He is dead. 

And he is smiling.

The tags have been removed from the man’s clothes. His teeth have been filed down and replaced. Even his fingertips are not his own. Only a patch sewn into the inside of his trousers gives any indication as to who he was, and to the desperate last act of his life…

But even as Waits pieces together this stranger’s identity, someone is sifting through the shards of his own. 

When mysterious fires, anonymous phone calls and outright threats start to escalate, he realises that a ghost from his own past haunts his every move. 

And to discover who the smiling man really is, he must first confront himself.

My Review

The Smiling Man is the second book in the Aidan Watts series. It is a series that I enjoy for its darkness, honesty and local setting. Manchester is a city I know reasonably well and I always enjoy reading a novel ‘knowing my way around’.

It is safe to say that neither Aidan, Sutty or Superintendent Parrs, who has the power to destroy Aidan would be the police officers who be my first choice for assistance. I think, after reading this book and learning more about Aidan’s life he would be the better option.

I was aware from reading Sirens of the problems that Aidan has had in his life. I knew he faced dismissal from the police for his actions. More of the hatred he faces from fellow officers and the control from the extremely sinister Parrs is revealed. You see the battle he faces with drug and alcohol abuse and living with what has happened in his past. I felt that most of the hatred felt was self hatred.

As well as the murder investigation, there was another story that ran through out the novel that concerned a young boy who had to assist a criminal. This side of the novel had more impact on me than any other part of the story. The guilt and fear for his sister’s safety if he’d didn’t do as he was told was chilling and often uncomfortable to read. More so, because it was so convincing.

I am currently reading book 3 in the series and I am loving reading the books together. It is highly recommended.

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Expectation by Anna Hope – Blog Tour Review.

About The Book

Hannah, Cate and Lissa are young, vibrant and inseparable. Living on the edge of a common in East London, their shared world is ablaze with art and activism, romance and revelry – and the promise of everything to come. They are electric. They are the best of friends.

Ten years on, they are not where they hoped to be. Amidst flailing careers and faltering marriages, each hungers for what the others have. And each wrestles with the same question: what does it take to lead a meaningful life? 

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received. Anna Hope is an author whose books I am always eager to read. They are the type of fiction that you are still thinking about days after finishing, there are scenes in her book Wake that I still think about a few years after reading it.

Hannah, Lissa and Cate have been friends for years. The reader sees their relationship develop throughout the novel through flashbacks. You see their dreams, first love, career, life choices and disappointments. You see the way they appear to others and the way they really feel. Most of the time they feel like failures, all for very different reasons.

Hannah was the character who appealed to me most, not only because I had a lot of sympathy for her, and the many women who go through similar situations but also because she was a lot warmer than the other two. Cate, I did struggle with occasionally but she dd grow on me and I appreciated her sense of humour and her putdowns. Lissa I struggled with more. I didn’t dislike her but she was more aloof. The reasons for this were explained in some degree towards the end.

The writing is stunning and the more I read about the three friends I was more reluctant to put the book down. I was totally engrossed in learning more about the three women and their families. None of it felt forced, there will be many people who see themselves, or their loved ones in any of these characters.

Highly recommended, one of my favourite books this year and I hope its not a long time to wait for book 4.

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The Last Stage by Louise Voss – Blog Tour Review.

About The Book

At the peak of her career as lead singer of a legendary 1980s indie band, Meredith Vincent was driven off the international stage by a horrific incident. Now living a quiet existence in a cottage on the grounds of an old stately home, she has put her past behind her and come to terms with her new life.

When a body is found in the manicured gardens of her home, and a series of inexplicable and unsettling events begins to occur, it becomes clear that someone is watching, someone who knows who she is … Someone who wants vengeance.

And this is only the beginning…

A dark, riveting and chilling psychological thriller, The Last Stage is also a study of secrets and obsessions, where innocent acts can have the most terrifying consequences.

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received. The Last Stage is the second book that I have read by Louise Voss and much like the first it is a slow burner, where the reader has little idea what expect.

There are quite a few narrators. Meredith, her twin brother Pete, two police officers, one of whom is a new officer, and two very unsavoury characters. One of these I did identify fairly early on, the other I was completely wrong about.

There are a few scenes that contain violence but none of them are gratuitous. They didn’t need to be, anybody who reads this can imagine the terror that Meredith felt. Not only for the threat to herself, but also towards people she cares deeply about. She was happy in her new life and doesn’t want her past to affect it. In particular she didn’t want to think about who was responsible for her injury and the reasons why she turned her back on the music industry.

Meredith was a character who I liked more as I read. I found her to be honest, felt her remorse over the abandonment of her family and admired her determination to live her life without revealing her past and relying on her fame to be successful. Her type of music I was familiar with, being roughly the same age but I was never a fan. Unlike Mavis, who made me smile a lot.

It was slightly different too much of the crime fiction I usually read. Not as dark but many of the character felt more real. In particular the police team. The frustration, admiration and determination to impress all made a very entertaining novel to read.