Death in the Village (Sukey Reynolds #11) by Betty Rowlands

I do enjoy this Britsh cozy murder mystery series featuring DC Sukey Reynolds though I often find that the synopsis is a bit misleading. Reading about Sukey's latest cases is like coming home. The characters are all so familiar and there is usually quite a bit going on in the local areas handled by the Avon and Somerset Constabulary where Sukey is in CID. I feel that, if you want to get the most from the stories, it is important to read them all in order from the beginning as Sukey has made some really significant changes in her personal and professional life over the years.

The CID team is all hands on deck as they are investigating a missing persons case. Daisy Hewett, a 15-year-old girl had left home for school 3 weeks prior and had seemingly vanished. It seems that the situation is quite similar to another cold case -- another girl, Valerie Deacon, had disappeared 20 years ago and police believe the same person might be responsible. Then, the body of a girl is found buried under some bricks in a ditch...Meanwhile, Sukey has another suspicious death to be concerned about when a homeowner is found dead in her bathroom. The woman, Adelaide Minchin, was well-liked and quite healthy and her GP is certain that a fall did not kill her. The coroner isn't convinced, however, so Sukey enlists the help of her journalist boyfriend, Harry Matthews, to do some digging around into the woman's family history to find out who might benefit from her death. Could these seemingly unrelated cases be connected? NO SPOILERS.

I love the writing style and the narrative flow of these books in the series. As a reader, you feel as if the installments just pick up where the last one left off as if you were just following Sukey around in her job and in her life. Sukey is a great character and very likeable. This one didn't have her interacting much with her son, Fergus, but she's busy and she does have a new romantic interest that might be taking more of her focus. She works hard and doesn't seem to be messed up or damaged or have a tendency to do stupid things -- and I appreciate that. I'm definitely looking forward to the next episode as the cases are always interesting.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for the e-book ARC to read and review.

This is book #11 in the series and these books should be read in order from the beginning.
Genre - cozy mystery and police procedural series

Her Missing Child (DI Jessica Blake #2) by Kerry Watts

DI Jessica Blake and her colleague, DC Dylan Logan, investigate the case of a missing 6-month-old baby boy, Finlay Lucas. The detectives of Police Scotland are stymied by a mother who suffers from post-natal depression and can't remember anything and her husband, the baby's father, who has some secrets which make answering questions a tad bit difficult. Who took the baby from his cot and where is he? NO SPOILERS.

This wasn't the typical police procedural involving a kidnapped child. There are a lot of different characters and, at first, they are hard to keep track of as they are introduced into the narrative. Along with the usual police activities, there is an incredible amount of domestic drama between the spouses, relatives, friends and neighbors. Blake and Logan are assisted by PC Isla Wilde, who initially was acting as the family liaison officer to Darren and Claire Lucas, but who wants to be a detective and acquits herself well. The story is propelled by quite a bit of action as everyone seems to be a possible suspect. I admit to being a bit surprised by who did what to whom as the red herrings were appropriately misleading. I enjoyed this second in the series more than the first and especially liked learning more about the personal history of Jessica Blake and definitely am intrigued to see what happens for her next. The case is eventually brought to a satisfying conclusion and I'll be looking for the third installment.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for this e-book ARC to read and review.

This is the second book in the series and I think they should be read in order.
Original title - Safe Home
Genre - police procedural and domestic drama

Combustible Punch by Paul Michael Peters

Rick Philips was the only survivor of a high school shooting. Though severely injured, he recovered and published the story of that fateful day. His book, SHELTER IN PLACE, became a bestseller and Rick achieved a measure of fame and fortune along with a job teaching at DuPont University. He's still tortured by nightmares, failed marriages and has no further success at writing. Nearly broke and an alcoholic, he attends a writer's conference and meets a most unusual woman, Harriet Bristol Wheeler. She has a proposition for him -- write her story. Harriet reveals a secret to Rick: she's a serial killer. She says she will tell all and he will write the book. She even offers him something he's not sure he can refuse -- she will commit a final murder and he can name the victim. NO SPOILERS.

This was interesting but the quirky writing style made the narrative quite confusing. Harriet is a chameleon and Rick a drunk so it's hard to know sometimes what is real and what is not. Neither of the characters was likeable and their motivations were hard to believe or empathize with despite the fact that I really wanted to do so. Most of it required me to have the capacity to suspend disbelief. I'm not sure of the facts about serial killers are correct but it's true, female serials are not as common as male ones. I think I was wanting more detail than was given about Harriet, her victims and the truth. After all the meandering about finding evidence to prove to Rick that Harriet was honest about what she had done, the conclusion came rather abruptly and there seemed to be a sense that the ending was too pat and unfinished. Would I read another book by this author? I don't know.

Thank you to NetGalley and the author for this e-book ARC to read and review.

This is a standalone and is not part of any series.
Genre - action, drama, thriller (sort of)

Taken to the Grave (#2 Jo Fournier) by M.M. Chouinard

Detective Jo Fournier and her partner, Detective Bob Arnett, have their team working around the clock when several people on the staff and faculty of Oakhurst University in Massachusetts turn up dead. They know that the cases are related because of the tarot cards found in proximity to the victims. There are several immediate suspects but this spree killing may be related to some sort of vigilantism or is it revenge? NO SPOILERS

This is the second book I've read featuring Jo Fournier and it was every bit as fast-paced and entertaining as the first. I like the writing and the characters as the focus is mainly on the case investigation but we also learn a bit more about Jo's personal life. Jo loves her job and has come a long way back from a tragedy in her past and is good at what she does. The camaraderie on the team is evident and they work well together. The motives and complexity of the murders were explained from the point of view of the killer in various chapters but all is revealed in the conclusion. There were a couple of surprises along the way as well. I'm looking forward to the next installment!

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for this e-book ARC to read and review.

This is #2 in a series and should be read after the first one.
Genre - police procedural, detectives, murder mystery

The Stranger Inside by Lisa Unger

"After something rips your psyche apart, they try to stitch you back together. The physical wounds, they've healed...But whatever got broken inside, it's still not right."

When Rain, Hank and Tess were 12 years old, a monster took their lives from them. Although Rain and Hank survived the ordeal, the scars really never healed. Their memory of the trauma and the death of their friend, Tess, binds them as well as repels them. Rain becomes an investigative journalist and Hank gets a PhD in psychology to help damaged children. Rain marries and has a child but Hank can't get over the past or form relationships. Neither feels that justice was served even though their kidnapper was caught. They are hobbling along best they can when their monster, Eugene Kreskey, is released from the psychiatric center and is later found murdered. And then it seems that a vigilante is out there killing others who were acquitted of crimes and escaped punishment. NO SPOILERS.

This was such a great story with themes of punishment, justice, revenge and healing. The writing is excellent and the pace is such that I simply couldn't bear to put the book down as I was desperate to find out what would happen next, what revelations would be exposed, and what would become of the two main characters. I have no frame of reference to completely understand how a child would recover from this kind of experience and how they could possibly be OK -- sure tons of therapy, etc., but the damage inflicted was so severe and it elicits so many feelings and pain even as one would try to move past it. The subject was quite sensitively handled and my heart ached for Rain and Hank in their struggles. There was so much going on in the narrative as it switched between the points of view and I was hooked from the first few paragraphs. I can see why this has been hyped as one of the most anticipated thrillers for this fall. I don't want to say any more so as not to ruin anything for the reader. Just get it already. If you like a good thriller, this won't disappoint.

Thank you to NetGalley and Park Row Books for this e-book ARC to read and review. I'll definitely be seeking out and reading more books by this author.

This is a standalone and is not part of any series.
Genre -- psychological theme but a thriller

His Secret Family by Ali Mercer

"...life was what happened in the space between what you wanted and what you got."

Jenny has two daughters, Ava and Ellie, and she's divorced from Sean when she reconnects with Mark Walsh -- the married man she had an affair with 16 years ago. Despite the misgivings her daughters have, Jenny is excited and happy to find him free and interested in re-establishing a relationship. But they both have secrets they've been keeping and now it's all coming out. Will the love between Jenny and Mark be strong enough to withstand his lies about his other family? NO SPOILERS.

Told in alternating points of view, the narrative unfolds with revelations and the subsequent reactions of the various characters. Each individual woman has a story to tell and the reader begins to see Mark in a different light as the truth emerges. The writing was good and the pace ideal for all the harbingers of things coming to be dropped to the reader. I couldn't quite buy into Ellie's apparent sixth sense or whatever she was experiencing, but all of the characters were a bit difficult to relate to. Although I'm not a huge fan of women's fiction or romance, this did engage and entertain me well enough. This is advertised as an "emotional page turner" and it pulled out a lot of those stops with the events in the book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for the e-book ARC to read and review. 

This is a standalone and is not part of any series.
Genre - domestic/family drama

Death on Clevedon Beach (Sukey Reynolds #10) by Betty Rowlands

Short and sweet, the latest Sukey Reynolds mystery focuses on the CID team investigation after a dismembered woman's body washes up on Clevedon Beach. The case is complicated by a drugs connection and reports of a special tattoo, a single Chinese character that means "Death" found on a couple of their suspects. Are they part of a larger organization and who is the mastermind behind it? No one is talking and Sukey, along with her cohort in Bristol, are looking for the murderer. NO SPOILERS.

As always, I enjoyed this installment in the series that I have read, in order, from the beginning. I've seen Sukey grow both personally and professionally as she's made the transition from SOCO to detective. She's living alone now since her son, Fergus, is away at University and she has broken off her long-term relationship with a former colleague. Is there a new romance in her future? I like her as a character and also find her workmates on the CID team to develop more fully as the series continues. The writing is good and the pace is very effective to advance the story until the case is solved -- usually because of some hunch that Sukey has. Of course she's a bit of a loose cannon and has to be reeled in at times, but hey, she's almost always right!

Thank you to Bookouture and NetGalley for this e-book ARC to read and review. I'm looking forward to reading #11 soon.

This is the 10th book in a long-running series and it's best to read these in order from the beginning.
Genre -- cozy murder mystery

29 Seconds by T.M. Logan

"I am not talking about the law, I'm talking about justice."

When 32-year-old Dr. Sarah Haywood, married mother of two, finds herself at the end of her rope due to sexual harassment by her boss, Dr. Alan Lovelock, at Queen Anne University, she has one chance to turn the tables. After agonizing endlessly over the morality of the offered solution, she decides to accept and thus sets in motion a cat and mouse game with far-reaching consequences. NO SPOILERS.

This was a quick easy read that I finished in a couple of hours. Although it stretched the limits of my ability to suspend disbelief, it had lots of action, short chapters, and was very readable. I wasn't quite sure how it would all come out but anticipated much of the conclusion nevertheless. I can't say that I liked the main character, Sarah, but had hopes that she would prevail. The subject and theme of this novel is sexual predator behavior and Alan Lovelock is portrayed as a colossal misogynistic jerk and it was quite satisfying to see how things worked out for him in the end.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the e-book ARC to read and review. I've read another work by this author and am eager to read his next thriller.

This is a standalone and is not part of any series.
Genre - domestic thriller, sexual harassment theme

Where the Light Enters (#2) by Sara Donati

What a story! Although a follow-up to THE GILDED HOUR (released in 2015), this could be read as a standalone, though I'd definitely not recommend it. Indeed it is captivating and mesmerizing in its scope and depth of life in New York City in 1884. The hefty novel (670 pages) is great historical fiction and focuses on two very strong women, the Drs. Anna and Sophie Savard, cousins who are two of the few practicing women physicians during this time period. Related through a very complicated bloodline, Anna is white and Sophie is mulatto, and their family tree is as diverse as can be imagined. Their relationship to their huge family is so complex that it requires a section in the front of the book listing all the primary characters! You may need to refer to it especially if you haven't read the first book. Regardless, the author is very adept at explanations and detail to help keep them straight.

The novel begins with Dr. Sophie Savard Verhoeven's return to New York after accompanying her husband, Peter (Cap), to Switzerland where he died of tuberculosis. She has kept up with her extended family though many letters during her absence, and comes back to claim her husband's estate and to, hopefully, establish a scholarship program for "colored girls who want to study medicine." Sophie, a specialist in gynecology, quickly reconnects with her cousin, Dr. Anna Savard Mezzanote -- physician and surgeon -- who has married Detective Sergeant Mezzanote of the New York Police. In no time at all, Sophie and Anna, along with Jack and his partner DS Oscar Maroney, become embroiled in a mystery that seems to have a link to a case that stymied them in the first book, the unsolved Multipara Homicides. Nine different women sought out illegal operations (abortions) and were essentially murdered by whomever performed the procedure; the deaths of these women were intentional. The perpetrator was never caught or convicted though Jack and Oscar have their suspicions. When another victim turns up in the morgue showing signs of imprisonment and torture, Jack, Oscar, Sophie and Anna step up their investigation. Meanwhile, there are many family dramas and other activities to keep them all very busy. NO SPOILERS

I really enjoyed this book and it took me far longer than usual to read because I savored every page and kept rereading certain parts. I love historical fiction, especially if it has anything medical in it, and there was so much within the narrative to provide the descriptiveness and information that I crave. I loved the characters and their quirks -- there's nothing like a large family to add some spice and flavor to a story. It's a great saga and I hope that there will be another book to follow as I still have a huge interest in them all and want to know more. Any fan of a good mystery cloaked in historical detail will be completely engrossed. It can't be over!

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishers for this e-book ARC to savor and review. Don't miss it!

This is a sequel to THE GILDED HOUR and is meant to be read after finishing that one.
Genre - historical fiction, family saga, mystery

Pretty Guilty Women by Gina LaManna

A man lies dead under a collapsed pergola on the grounds of the exquisite Serenity Spa & Resort -- the site of the impending DeBleu/Banks wedding. Detective Ramone begins to question the witnesses and the story they tell becomes extremely complicated as four women all claim to have been the sole killer. Reminiscent of BIG LITTLE LIES, this very entertaining novel is impossible to put down and begs to be read in a single sitting!

Told from the viewpoints of the main characters in alternating chapters and flipping backward and forward in time, the fascinating tale evolves as the reader gets to know each of the women and their hopes, dreams, wishes, desires, heartaches and secrets. All have come to this wedding event for different reasons with the underlying theme being a reunion of old college friends and former roommates who had fallen out of touch. Ginger, Kate and Emily meet strangers Lulu Franc and Sydney Banks (and her baby Lydia) in the hotel lobby the night they arrive and they get to know one another and reconnect in the bar over drinks. I loved the characterization of each woman and I definitely liked the writing style and the way the narrative focused aspects of their individual personalities, worries, problems and issues. It's full of drama and I actually could relate to them. After all, what woman alive doesn't want to figure out how to "have it all" and usually falling short? It was a fun, easy read and I really enjoyed it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks for the e-book ARC to read and review.

This is a standalone and is not part of any series.
Genre -- Women's fiction, mystery, murder, secrets and lies

The Sleepover (DI Natalie Ward #4) by Carole Wyer

DI Natalie Ward and her team at Samford HQ have their hands full! A house fire, determined to be arson, leads to discovery of the incinerated body of 14-year-old Roxy Curtis. What was the young teenager doing in a Victorian mansion owned by two brothers who are high-flying nightclub owners? The brothers claim they have never met Roxy and don't know how she got into their secured home. Roxy had told her mom, Cathy, that she was spending the night at her best friend Ellie's house. When questioned, Ellie isn't exactly truthful nor are any of the other people who are interviewed in this very complicated case that is frustrating Natalie, DS Lucy Carmichael, PC Ian Jarvis, and DS Murray Anderson. More suspicious deaths follow and Natalie is convinced that if she can get to the bottom of all the secrets and lies it will lead them to the killer. NO SPOILERS.

There is a lot going on in this detective mystery and also in the personal lives of the team at Samford. Natalie is still dealing with her husband, David, and trying to work through the issues in their marriage. Lucy is a bit nervous about the upcoming birth of the baby with her partner. Ian can't make up his mind about whether or not to chuck the police job to make it work with Scarlett. And then there's still the ongoing tension between Natalie and head of Forensics, Mike Sullivan -- who happens to be David's best friend. (Ah, yes, a romantic triangle and one I had really hoped would go no further.) So lots of domestic turmoil and a surfeit of teenage rebellion and angst. I always like to test myself to see if I can guess the outcome and solve the case before Natalie does and I won't say who won this round.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for this e-book ARC to read and review. I will continue to follow this enjoyable series.

This is the 4th book in a series that should be read in order from the beginning.
Genre - female detective, mystery

The Woman Upstairs by Ruth Heald

When all seems lost, pregnant-with-twins Katie thinks she has found the perfect helpmate in Paula. After the girls are born, Katie's world comes crashing down and Paula is there providing care and support for all 3 of them. But there's something not quite right in the house and soon Katie feels that she no longer has any control over her life and her little babies. NO SPOILERS.

The narrative unfolds between flashbacks and present day making the plot twists easy to anticipate. As the story in present day is told from the first person view of Katie, I couldn't help feeling that she was a total mess and quite stupid. Nothing she did made any sense and her decisions and reactions were none I could remotely relate to -- in short, I couldn't stand her. For that matter, all of the characters in this novel were unlikeable though some worse than others. I found it hard to wrap my head around Katie's behavior and, since I had already leapt to the obvious, I didn't feel any tension or suspense. It was a quick read, however, and some readers might disagree with my assessments. Perhaps I've just read way too many psychological thrillers and may just need to step away from what seems to be the same old secrets and lies where the protagonist trusts someone who is completely deranged or evil. And I can definitely say that there is no way I would have spent a single night in that house much less befriended a Paula. But maybe I'm a jaded cynic!

The title was changed from YOUR GUILTY LIES which I received as an ARC to read and review from NetGalley and Bookouture. Thank you for the opportunity.

This is a standalone and not part of any series.
Genre - psychological, domestic drama