Tag: Pigeonhole

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Many Rivers To Cross by Peter Robinson – Review – First Monday Crime.

About The Book

A skinny young boy is found dead – his body carelessly stuffed into wheelie bin.

Detective Superintendent Alan Banks and his team are called to investigate. Who is the boy, and where did he come from? Was he discarded as rubbish, or left as a warning to someone? He looks Middle Eastern, but no one on the East Side Estate has seen him before.

As the local press seize upon an illegal immigrant angle, and the national media the story of another stabbing, the police are called to investigate a less newsworthy death: a middle-aged heroin addict found dead of an overdose in another estate, scheduled for redevelopment.

Banks finds the threads of each case seem to be connected to the other, and to the dark side of organised crime in Eastvale. Does another thread link to his friend Zelda, who is facing her own dark side? 

The truth may be more complex – or much simpler – than it seems . . .

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received via Pigeonhole. Many Rivers To Cross is the latest novel in the Inspector Banks series. I found it slightly different to the previous books. Banks seemed to feature less with more focus on Gerry and Annie. When he does appear though, you still see his love of music and fine wine. My thoughts about his character though are changing with each novel. Maybe because of the TV series but also because his increasing loneliness makes him more vulnerable and a little needy with the women he knows.

There is also more focus on modern day news than in previous books. Politics, particularly Brexit, human trafficking, drugs and racism. All of which is seen daily in the news. One of these topics in particular, is covered more than the others and its heartbreaking and unfortunately very real.

One of the more interesting parts of the novel was Zelda’s story. She was a character I really liked. What she went through before her arrival in the UK was horrific and I can see her appearing in a few novels in the future.

This series has the potential to be successful for years to come. I can see it changing, some characters appearing more as Banks gets closer to retirement age but there are still plenty of stories there.

Peter Robinson will be appearing at First Monday Crime on Monday 7th October .

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Nothing To Hide by James Oswald – Review.

About The Book

Suspended from duty after her last case ended in the high-profile arrest of one of Britain’s wealthiest men, DC Constance Fairchild is trying to stay away from the limelight. Fate has other ideas . . .

Coming home to her London flat, Constance stumbles across a young man, bloodied, mutilated and barely alive. She calls it in and is quickly thrown into the middle of a nationwide investigation . . . It seems that the victim is just the latest in a string of similar ritualistic attacks. 

No matter that she is off-duty, no matter that there are those in the Met who would gladly see the back of her, Con can’t shake her innate determination to bring the monsters responsible for this brutality to justice.

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received via Pigeonhole. Nothing To Hide is a follow up novel that I couldn’t wait to read after loving No Time To Cry. It could be read as a standalone novel but I do recommend you read them in order.

Con has been suspended from her job following the events of book one and is treated with disdain by both her colleagues and the press. Neither of who can accept that she is Lady Constance, even though she has no interest in the title, has little time for her parents and doesn’t get any financial benefit from having the title. I did feel their treatment was a little unfair, considering she was only doing her job.

But she does her best to ignore them and finds allies in Karen Eve, Bain and Diane Shepherd. They do their best to include her in the investigation that concerns the young man she found and others that have died from their injuries.

It takes place in London and Edinburgh and I was very happy to see some crossover characters from the author’s other series. One of them I recognised instantly, the other two I had to check my facts.

Often worrying but there is also humour, the type that I love. Con doesn’t take any prisoners, she refuses to show respect if she doesn’t feel its deserved and she definitely doesn’t suffer fools. Her friendship with Karen Eve is one I want to see develop and I also want to see her family become more settled after the events that happen here. I also want to see how she handles an officer who I expect she will have to work with closely.

I know that there are many who like the Inspector Mclean series, I have only read two from that. Whilst I enjoy it, this is my favourite. Con is a character that I love to read about.

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I’ll Find You by Liz Lawler – Blog Tour Review.

About The Book

Emily Jacobs, a nurse, is in hospital for a minor operation. When she wakes in the night, woozy with anaesthetic, she sees the doctor frantically trying to resuscitate the woman in the bed next to her. In the morning, she is told that she must have had a nightmare. The bed has been empty all along . . .

When Emily returns to work she discovers a bracelet that she believes belonged to the missing woman. Soon, she becomes convinced that her colleagues at the hospital are hiding a terrible secret. 
What if she’s wrong? What if her own troubled past has affected her more than she knows?

But what if she’s right? 

What else could they be capable of?

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the book which I read via the Pigeonhole App. This is the first book that I have read by Liz Lawler and also the first medical thriller that have read for a long time. I have to say that if I had read this book before the operation I had a couple of years ago I would have cancelled it! Whilst this thriller is medical it is easy to understand. Even if you are like me and don’t know all the terminology it doesn’t read like a text book.

Emily is an excellent nurse whose life has been turned upside down by the disappearance of her younger sister. After leaving her high pressure job at the local hospitals starts working at the much quieter private hospital. When she has a procedure at the same hospital she witnesses something that she is told didn’t happen. But Emily isn’t prepared to accept what she is being told.

Emily was a difficult person to warm too. I wasn’t entirely sure if I trusted her at first. But when I got to know her more and see her isolation I had more sympathy and liking for her. Her parents were horrible with her, especially her mother and she also had a stilted relationship with her new colleagues who didn’t really come across as approachable or that caring.

It is definitely a strange novel, there was more than one victim in the novel and I had a lot of sympathy for many characters. The final reveal though was certainly one I didn’t expect. and it left me a little disturbed.

This was a great novel to read via pigeonhole, each stave ended on a cliffhanger when I couldn’t wait to read more the following day. If I read it as a conventional book I would have read it over a couple of days, instead it took ten.


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And So It Begins by Rachel Abbott – Review.

 

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About The Book

Cleo knows she should be happy for her brother Mark. He’s managed to find someone new after the sudden death of his first wife – but something about Evie just doesn’t feel right…

When Evie starts having accidents at home, her friends grow concerned. Could Mark be causing her injuries? Called out to their cliff-top house one night, Sergeant Stephanie King finds two bodies entangled on blood-drenched sheets.

Where does murder begin? When the knife is raised to strike, or before, at the first thought of violence? As the accused stands trial, the jury is forced to consider – is there ever a proper defence for murder?

My Review

With thanks to the publisher for the copy received. This is the first book that I have read by Rachel Abbott and I’m in for a treat catching up if they are as good as this.
The scene that faces police officers Stephanie and Jason is a grim one. Af first it appears that both of the people covered in blood are dead but Evie is still alive. And she has a tale to tell.
The novel is mainly about women. Evie, the accused but also victim, Cleo, Evie’s sister-in-law, Stephanie, the police officer who has attended two deaths at the Cliff top house, Harriet a woman’s rights lawyer and Aminah, who I had a lot of sympathy for, she was a friend to both Evie and Cleo and had the misfortune to be caught up in the middle of Evie’s and Cleo’s relationship.
I read this novel via the Pigeonhole app and it was serialised over ten days. Each ‘stave’ ended on a cliffhanger and had me wishing my life away, anxious to find out what would be revealed next.
Very few of the characters were shown favourably. Aminah was the only one that I liked. The others all had too many hidden agendas or secrets. Cleo was probably my least favourite. Too possessive and controlling of her brother and I didn’t like the way she was with her niece.
I changed my mind constantly about what was happening. Why did Evie do what she did? Was Cleo involved in Mia’s death? Or was it all connected by events from years earlier?
Very little went the way I thought it would. I was duped through most of the novel and I wonder if I would have thought differently if I had it read it the normal way. At first I thought the ending a little abrupt, it was definitely unexpected. But on reflection it worked very well.
A fantastic novel, and I loved the way I read it. Having the control taken out of my hands with how much I could read added to the intrigue and Rachel Abbott is an author I am looking forward to reading again.

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The Corset by Laura Purcell – Review.

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About the Book

Is prisoner Ruth Butterham mad or a murderer? Victim or villain?

Dorothea and Ruth.

Prison visitor and prisoner. Powerful and powerless.

Dorothea Truelove is young, wealthy and beautiful. Ruth Butterham is young, poor and awaiting trial for murder.

When Dorothea’s charitable work leads her to Oakgate Prison, she is delighted with the chance to explore her fascination with phrenology and test her hypothesis that the shape of a person’s skull can cast a light on their darkest crimes. But when she meets teenage seamstress Ruth, she is faced with another theory: that it is possible to kill with a needle and thread. For Ruth attributes her crimes to a supernatural power inherent in her stitches.

The story Ruth has to tell of her deadly creations – of bitterness and betrayal, of death and dresses – will shake Dorothea’s belief in rationality, and the power of redemption.

Can Ruth be trusted? Is she mad, or a murderer?

My Review

The Corset is a book that contains everything I love in fiction. Historical crime with a gothic twist. It also is convincing portrayal of how difficult it was for those who lived in poverty and the attitudes towards women at the time.
The two women concerned, Dorothea who is a wealthy and single socialite is fascinated by phrenology. She engages in good deeds at the women’s prison and uses the women there to learn more about it. Ruth is one of the young women who she meets and she is the one who intrigues her the most. Because she has been accused of and admitted to murder. The method that Ruth describes is different to every type of murder and as you read her story more is revealed.
I preferred Ruth’s story by a long way. Her tragic childhood and then her experiences at the hands of her employers were eye-opening. More so, because I felt that this was an accurate account of what it would have been like for many. Some of the things that happened to her I had to research myself. I had heard of them but not by the names they were known in the book.
It took me longer to warm to Dorothea. I did have sympathy but at times I found her selfish and condescending. But with her family background and the way she was controlled by her father it got easier to understand her. At times she seemed cold and a little bitter but then I could see a softer side as well. If she was allowed to do what interested her and be with who she wanted she would probably have been completely different.
At times it was creepy but not as much as I expected. Most of the time I thought Ruth’s ‘talent’ was in her head apart from certain events that did happen. I did guess at some of the eventual outcome but there was one part I didn’t see coming and it was one of the better finales in books I have read this year. That much, I read the last chapter again.
I read this book as serialised fiction via pigeonhole so I would like to thank both them and the publisher for the copy received.