#BlogTour - Ghost Story by Elisa Lodato

 

From the Costa First Novel Award shortlisted author of An Unremarkable Body

She came to write, but the island has its own story . . .

Off the windswept coast of Scotland lies Finish Island, rugged and remote. Once a home, it now stands abandoned, a place of dark history and deep memory, a place that holds its stories close. Unable to write since her daughter's death, it's here that Seren comes to work, hoping that the solitude and silence will inspire her next novel.

But the island holds memories of its own, restless and unwilling to stay buried. As unsettling occurrences become even more bizarre and frightening, Seren starts seeing uncanny resonances between her past and the island's history. There is something on this island, something ancient and unforgiving. 

Will Seren discover its secrets, before it's too late?

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An intriguing and unusual novel, GHOST STORY begins with an email exchange between Jamie Doughty and his late ex-wife, Seren’s publishers. It appears that Seren has passed away ‘on that island’ while writing the novel commissioned by the publishers and whose manuscript they would now like to publish. Jamie refuses, arguing that the manuscript in his possession is ‘not a work of fiction’ and it is apparent he holds the publishers responsible for whatever has happed to Seren.

What then follows appears to be that manuscript and tells Seren's story as she does indeed travel to remote Scottish Hebridean Ireland, inspired by the story of a massacre that took place there hundreds of years before and hoping that the location will reignite her creative spark. It's quickly evident that Seren’s manuscript is not a novel, at least not a conventional novel, but rather a memoir telling of the events that brought her to travel to the island and later when she gets to the island it takes the form of journal entries and dispersed with chapters of her intended novel. The prose is melancholy, and slow-moving, and utterly engrossing. Seren’s first novel was a huge success, her second a comparative failure. Her daughter and sister were murdered in an arson attack carried out by her sister’s deranged partner, and Seren’s marriage, to Jamie, did not survive the tragedy. Contacted by her publisher with an offer for a story about ‘“Ghosts…not ghosts that go bump-in-the-night but the inner demon, you know”’ Seren decides to visit the Western Isles, where she spent holidays as a child, Finish Island, uninhabited since 1912 but whose population had been massacred by clansmen centuries before. Seren hopes the location, and the solitude, will inspire her but the reader can’t help but feel that she is trying to escape the grief which which she has been living, grief which, perhaps quiet at times, never leaves.

It would be unfair to reveal any more of the plot, suffice to say I found it gripping and intensely moving. Elisa Lodato is a talented writer. Her prose is exquisite, her dialog modern and realistic. Sadness and grief are present on every page but the book is never gloomy and GHOST STORY lives up to its title as a feeling of increasing dread takes hold in the latter stages. It is chilling and atmospheric. It doesn’t tie everything up in a neat bow, and I liked that. For days after finishing the novel I was still thinking about it - did things happen as they appeared to, as Seren had recorded them? Did the remoteness of the island take a toll on Seren’s sanity? Were the ghosts real or ‘inner demons’, or both? I don’t know but the questions will stay for some time.

#BlogTour - Still See You Everywhere by Lisa Gardner

A remote tropical island. Countless dangerous secrets. No way to call help.

‘A master of the thriller genre’ David Baldacci
‘Full-on action’ Sunday Times
‘The very definition of the word "unputdownable"' Tess Gerritsen
‘Masterful. Not to be missed’ Karin Slaughter
‘This thriller has enough twists and turns to make you dizzy. If you haven’t read Frankie Elkin yet, start now!’ Lisa Scottoline
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Missing persons specialist Frankie Elkin is on an isolated island off the coast of Hawaii.

Her mission: to find Lani, the missing sister of a Death Row serial killer known as the Beautiful Butcher who is awaiting execution in just three weeks’ time.

According to the Beautiful Butcher’s sources, Lani is being held captive by her millionaire ex-boyfriend on the island. The only way to gain access is for Frankie to go undercover.

But can Frankie really trust the word of a serial killer?

Plus, this island is no paradise with deadly creatures and suspicious co-workers at every turn, and an incoming tropical storm about to cut her off from the outside world.

Could this be Frankie Elkin’s most dangerous case yet?
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STILL SEE YOU EVERYWHERE is the third book in Lisa Gardner's Frankie Elkin series. I have read the author before but not this series, but found myself right at home from the start. The setup is the traditional detective novel, very familiar, but with a twist. Think The Big Sleep - the detective, Philip Marlowe, visits a prospective client, who wants him to find a missing person, Rusty Regan - immediately you know where you are. Here we have Frankie Elkin, unlicensed and self-driven missing persons investigator, visiting a prospective client, and being asked to find her missing sister. However, in this case, the client is a serial killer, a woman on death row for the murder of 18 men, who wants Frankie to find the sister she lost touch with 12 years ago, whom she believes is being held captive by a tech millionaire, The Beautiful Butcher's ex, on an isolated island in the Pacific.

So, we have echoes of The Big Sleep, The Silence of the Lambs, Glass Onion, perhaps a bit of Jack Reacher in our nomadic central character. We also have an intriguing protagonist in Frankie Elkin, and a talented author in Lisa Gardner, who takes these familiar elements and builds a singular, unusual and pulse-pounding thriller, which bears comparison to the influences. I liked Frankie a lot. She is driven by a need to fight for those forgotten, or ignored, by the traditional authorities, witty and funny, yet full of self-doubt and uncertainty. The plot is full of twists, keeping the reader guessing right until the end. The supporting characters are rounded and interesting, and some of their backstories could make for very readable novels themselves. Lisa Gardner's prose is excellent and makes you want to continue reading, her dialogue is realistic and natural. Above all, her research is incredible, and used to flesh out the story rather than being an information dump. Nothing I learned pulled me out of the exciting events but, later, I was inspired to learn more about Pacific atolls, and disturbing coconut crabs, and wolf spiders, and pirate treasure (yes, pirate treasure...)

I thoroughly enjoyed STILL SEE YOU EVERYWHERE and will be exploring Frankie's other adventures. Thanks to Century Books UK, Compulsive Readers and, of course, Lisa Gardner for the opportunity to take part in the BlogTour. 

#BlogTour - The Silent Man by David Fennell

A father is murdered in the dead of night in his London home, his head wrapped tightly in tape, a crude sad face penned over his facial features. But the victim's only child is left alive and unharmed at the scene.

Met Police detectives Grace Archer and Harry Quinn have more immediate concerns. Notorious gangster Frankie White has placed a target on Archer's back, and there's no one he won't harm to get to her.

Then a second family is murdered, leaving young Uma Whitmore as the only survivor. Once again the victim's face is found wrapped and inked.

With a serial killer at large, DI Archer and DS Quinn must stay alive long enough to find the connection between these seemingly random victims. Can they do it before another child is made an orphan?

David Fennell is a new author to me. THE SILENT MAN is the third in his DI Grace Archer series, something I didn’t know when starting the book. The novel begins with a very tense and chilling murder of a father, by a killer who gains access to the victim’s home without force, without detection, and leaves no trace other than a man suffocated, his head taped, and a son who heard nothing, unaware until his discovery of his father’s body next morning.  We then meet DI Archer and DS Quinn.

Initially a little confusing, there is a lot going on, with several callbacks to events in previous novels but, like Marvel Comics used to do, anticipating that this might be a first reader, Fennell brings us up to speed, without excessive exposition, respecting his readers’ intelligence and ability to put it together. Di Archer is a prime target for a London Crime Boss who blames her for the death of a jailed family member and so targets Grace’s grandfather. There are moles in the Metropolitan Police and the organised crime gang seem able to attack Archer with impunity. It’s a little Infernal Affairs/The Departed in Charing Cross, and, while I wasn’t drawn to it as much as the concurrent hunt for the killer, possibly due to a lack of familiarity with the characters, it is well-plotted, very well written, and the protagonists engagingly drawn.

When a second body is discovered with seeming links to the first, another child the sole survivor, Archer and Quinn suspect a serial killer and it is here that things really took off for me. The killings, seen from the murderer’s POV, are harrowing and heart-stopping. The search for evidence is painstaking and littered with red herrings. As a procedural crime narrative the novel is first class, the constant threat hanging over the main detective, heightening the tension constantly. There are other subplots which eventually dovetail with the main threads and the author expertly garners the reader’s sympathies for the characters, and not always for those you might expect.

Yes, it may be have been better to start at the beginning of the series, but I did not feel lost or my enjoyment of the story irrevocably harmed by not doing so, and I look forward to dropping back and catching up.

#BlogTour - Infinity Gate by M. R. Carey

From the international bestselling M. R. Carey comes a thrilling novel set in the multiverse – the tale of humanity’s expansion across millions of dimensions, and the AI technology that might see it all come to an end . . .

INFINITY IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.

The Pandominion: a political and trading alliance of a million worlds – except that they’re really just the one world, Earth, in many different realities. And when an AI threat arises that could destroy everything the Pandominion has built, they’ll eradicate it by whatever means necessary, no matter the cost to human life.

Scientist Hadiz Tambuwal is looking for a solution to her own Earth’s environmental collapse when she stumbles across the secret of inter-dimensional travel. It could save everyone on her dying planet, but now she’s walked into the middle of a war on a scale she never dreamed of.

And she needs to choose a side before it kills her.

Discover the spectacular first novel in The Pandominion – an exhilarating new science fiction duology from the author of the million-copy bestseller The Girl With All the Gifts. Perfect for fans of The Space Between Worlds, The Long Earth and Children of Time.

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M. R. Carey’s THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS was one of my favourite novels of the last several years, a fresh take on the zombie apocalypse theme, and his recent KOLI trilogy was an equally original variation on post-apocalyptic society, so it comes as no surprise that INFINITY GATE is an equally thrilling twist on a familiar trope. In his new novel we get Carey’s version of the multiverse.

Hadiz Tambuwal is a scientist striving for a solution to her world’s impending ecological disaster who accidentally stumbles upon Step technology, a way of travelling to an alternate earth. With the, initially unwelcome, help of an opinionated AI, Hadiz begins to use drones to collect data from other Earths, at least in the vicinity of her base in Lagos and, when she ultimately fails in her quest to prevent her planet’s environmental implosion, she makes a home on the reality most resembling her own.

Essien Nkanika lives by his wits on the streets of Lagos and does whatever it takes to live - working jobs others would avoid, stealing, working cons, prostitution. Initially using Essien for sex, possibly for company, Hadiz eventually takes him into her confidence, sharing with him her discovery of the multiverse. And, of course, even though he has no idea how it works, Essien decides to steal the technology for his own profit. And the Pandominion is watching.

The Pandominion controls commerce and facilitates movement across a federation of multiverse worlds. They force order through the Cielo, the largest military organisation in history. And they do not take kindly to unauthorised Step Technology…

INFINITY GATE is a fantastically exciting Sci-Fi novel which pays homage to Carey’s influences but does not imitate them. There are echoes of THE FOREVER WAR and STARSHIP TROOPERS in the depiction of the Cielo but, at least to me, Carey’s characters are more relatable, more human (even, maybe especially, in the case of Paz), than Haldeman’s or, particularly, Heinlein’s, and I love those novels. INFINITY GATE can stand alongside them.

Carey keeps the reader guessing, as to where the story will go next, but also in how we feel about the characters. The idea of infinite realities could be overwhelming but Carey writes in deceptively simple prose which draws the reader into an immersive narrative so that we always understand what is going on, even when we don’t know what’s going on. I loved it and I cannot wait to find out what happens next.

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About the author:

M. R. Carey has been making up stories for most of his life. His novel The Girl With All the Gifts was a word-of-mouth bestseller and is now a major motion picture based on his own screenplay. Under the name Mike Carey he has written for both DC and Marvel, including critically acclaimed runs on Lucifer, Hellblazer and X-Men. His creator-owned series The Unwritten appeared regularly in the New York Times graphic fiction bestseller list. He also has several previous novels, games, radio plays, and TV and movie screenplays to his credit.

#BlogTour - The Messenger by Megan Davis

‘A sharply written, clever and classy thrill-ride through the streets of Paris. Atmospheric and twisting, The Messenger is a wonderful debut.’ Chris Whitaker   


Wealthy and privileged, Alex has an easy path to success in the Parisian elite. But he and his domineering father have never seen eye to eye. Desperate to escape the increasingly suffocating atmosphere of their apartment, Alex seeks freedom on the streets of Paris where his new-found friend Sami teaches him how to survive. But everything has a price - and one night of rebellion changes their lives forever. 


A simple plan to steal money takes a sinister turn when Alex's father is found dead. Despite protesting their innocence, both boys are imprisoned for murder. Seven years later Alex is released from prison with a single purpose: to discover who really killed his father. Yet as he searches for answers and atones for the sins of his past, Alex uncovers a disturbing truth with far-reaching consequences.



In the heart of Paris, against a backdrop of corruption, fake news and civil unrest, The Messenger is a mind-racing new thriller that follows one son's journey to find redemption and expose the truth. 

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 Set in Paris, Megan Davis’s THE MESSENGER is the story of a dysfunctional family, of Alex Giraud, an angsty teenager, born in France raised in USA, and struggling to fit in Paris to which he, and his father Eddy, have recently returned. Increasingly estranged from his father, bullied by his peers at school, Alex escapes to the streets of Paris where he meets Sami, a small time dealer, a survivor, who introduces him to drugs and the small-time criminals who traffic them. Alex sees a way to use the supply of recreational narcotics to buy his way into the circle of those whose approval he craves, but actually hates, and together he and Sami hatch a plan to rob Eddy, Alex’s father, a plan that ends in tragedy. 

The novel actually begins with Eddy’s death on Christmas Eve. Sami flees the apartment telling the hiding Alex not to go in, that, “He’ll be all right. He was still speaking.” Running to he father, Alex finds Eddy dying from stab wounds. And, seven years later, Alex is released from prison, having served a lighter sentence than the 25 years given to the older Sami, determined to find out who really murdered Eddy Giraud, and why. 

THE MESSENGER is engrossing, tightly plotted and peopled by realistic, characters most of whom are simultaneously fascinating and unlikeable. It is slow-paced but never boring and, as the author alternates between NOW and THEN, we learn a lot about Alex, his relationship with his father, and the events that led to Eddy’s death and Alex’s incarceration; we see the older Alex’s obsessive drive to find his father’s real murderer and clear his and Sami’s names. Megan Davis reveals just enough information so that both timelines build in a deliberate, measured way until, about two thirds of the way in, the pace explodes, the stakes get much higher, and we career to the shocking conclusion. 

 It is difficult to believe that THE MESSENGER is Megan Davis’s debut novel, such is the ease with which she handles the plot. The whodunnit elements are satisfying, the atmospheric setting, the seedy Parisian underbelly, thoroughly convincing, and the suspicion of a deeper conspiracy seeded just enough to build the oppressive, claustrophobic atmosphere. It feels ‘real’ and I was completely won over. 

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About the author 

Megan Davis was born in Australia and grew up in mining towns across the world. She has worked in the film industry and her credits include Atonement, In Bruges, Pride and Prejudice and the Bourne films. Megan is also a lawyer and is currently an associate at Spotlight on Corruption. She has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia. Her debut The Messenger won the Bridport Prize for a First Novel in 2018, judged by Kamila Shamsie, as well as the Lucy Cavendish Prize for unpublished writers in 2021. She has lived in many places, including France for a number of years, but now lives in London.

#BlogTour - The Stars Undying by Emery Robin

 

 THE STARS UNDYING

Emery Robin

 

 

Publishing 10^th November 2022, in paperback, £8.99

 

LOYALTY, LEGACY AND BETRAYAL...

 

Princess Altagracia has lost everything. After a bloody civil war, her twin sister has claimed not just the crown of their planet Szayet but the Pearl of its prophecy, a computer that contains the immortal soul of their god. Stripped of her birthright, Altagracia prepares to flee the planet - just as Matheus Ceirran, Commander of the interstellar Empire of Ceiao, arrives in deadly pursuit. Princess Altagracia sees an opportunity to win back her planet, her god, and her throne . . . if she can win over the Commander and his distrustful right-hand officer, Anita.

 

But talking her way into Commander Matheus's good graces, and his bed, is only the beginning. Dealing with the most powerful man in the galaxy is almost as dangerous as war, and Altagracia is quickly torn between Matheus and the wishes of the machine god that whispers in her ear.

 

For Szayet's sake, and her own, Altagracia will need to become more than a princess with a silver tongue. She will have to become a queen as history has never seen before - even if it breaks an empire.

 

A spectacular space opera debut perfect for readers of Ann Leckie's Ancillary Justice and Arkady Martine's A Memory Called Empire, inspired by the lives and loves of Cleopatra and Julius Caesar.

 

Praise for The Stars Undying

 

‘A glittering triumph that weaves together history and tragedy into a star-spanning epic. I fell into this book and didn't come out for a long time’ - Everina Maxwell

 

''Gorgeously written, clever and captivating’ - Kristyn Merbeth

 

‘Dazzling, transportive, boundless, precise - and dares to ask, what if Mark Antony was the hottest butch girl in space?’ - Casey McQuiston

 

‘Takes the larger-than-life figures of the ancient world and recasts them against a backdrop of drowned worlds and interstellar empires with extraordinary verve’ - Emily Tesh

 

'Beautifully written, with poise and wit and grand epic sweep, The Stars Undying has everything I want from a space opera’ - AK Larkwood

 

'Deftly wields the conventions of science fiction to make old stories new... I did not know I could weep for Antony, love Cleopatra, or lament Caesar, but through Ana, Gracia, and Ceirran, I do’ - Maya Deane

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I have always been interested in Roman history, particularly Julius Caesar, since I had a picture book on Roman legions as a child. I studied Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar at O-level and Antony and Cleopatra at A-level, have read multiple biographies of Caesar, histories of the Roman Republic and Empire, even struggled through a few fictionalised versions of the dictator’s life. But I have rarely, if ever, before come across a book which adds so much perspective to this period of history, and the protagonists, by taking the characters and themes and dropping them into a completely different time, and space, adding depth and making the story brand new. 

It is difficult to comprehend that THE STARS UNDYING is a debut novel, so assured is Emery Robin in drawing realistic, flawed characters an giving them a voice different from any of the histories and biographies. The story of Gracia and Ceirran, and of Ana, can be read as a standalone space opera, full of political intrigue and empire-building, and would, I imagine, be thoroughly satisfying; but if the reader knows that Gracia is Cleopatra, Ceirran is Caesar, Ana is Mark Antony, and so on, it adds a deeper understanding of both the novel and its characters and of the historical figures on which they are based. It is not perfect, the alternating view points of Gracia and Ceirran can be a little overwhelming, and it might have benefited from a glossary, such are the number of characters; but it is a hugely entertaining, moving, and impressive debut. 

Robin knows the history and many of the expected events, and some of the myths, are present - the carpet, the dictator’s triumph, a stunning echo of Pompey’s treatment by the Egyptians which takes the breath away - but there are also little touches which make the initiated smile, without ever detracting from the flow of the novel, such as ‘Ceiao’s greatest speaker’, Cachoerian, being so susceptible to flattery that ‘the same flattery worked every time’ just as was Rome’s greatest speaker, Cicero.

One of the novel’s greatest strengths is the new light is sheds on Cleopatra. The previous books I have read, great though many of them are, are dominated by the male protagonists, Cleopatra being very much relegated to supporting character. Here, Gracia is as strong, stronger, than her male counterparts, she really drives the political manoeuvring in the plot. She is, by her own admission, a liar, an unreliable novel, but she is strong and assured, ruthless, and, even at the end of the book, I am still unsure what to make of her. But I look forward to finding out.

#BlogTour - The Party House by Lin Anderson

'A real page-turner' – Ian Rankin

The Party House by Lin Anderson is a deeply atmospheric psychological thriller set in the Scottish Highlands, for fans of Lucy Foley, Ruth Ware and Sarah Pearse’s The Sanatorium.

Devastated by a recent pandemic brought in by outsiders, the villagers of Blackrig in the Scottish Highlands are outraged when they find that the nearby estate plans to reopen its luxury ‘party house’ to tourists.

As animosity sparks amongst the locals, part of the property is damaged and, in the ensuing chaos, the body of a young girl is found in the wreck. Seventeen-year-old Ailsa Cummings went missing five years ago, never to be seen again – until now.

The excavation of Ailsa’s remains ignites old suspicions cast on the men of this small community, including Greg, the estate’s gamekeeper. At the beginning of a burgeoning relationship with a new lover, Joanne, Greg is loath to discuss old wounds. Frightened by Greg’s reaction to the missing girl’s discovery, Joanne begins to doubt how well she knows this new man in her life. Then again, he’s not the only one with secrets in their volatile relationship . . .

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My first experience of the author, Lin Anderson’s THE PARTY HOUSE is very much a psychological thriller. The novel begins with the disappearance of Ailsa Cummings, a seventeen-year-old who vanishes from the woods surrounding the village of Blackrig in the Scottish Highlands, presumed by many to have run away, perhaps back to her former home in Glasgow. Five years later, the village is slowly recovering from the  devastation caused by the deaths of five children and a district nurse, their deaths due to a Covid 19 variant introduced by lockdown breaking visitors to the eponymous Party House, owned by an investment company. Post-lockdown, the return of outside guests to the resort causes some in the village to take their anger out by destroying a hot-tum on the property, inadvertently exposing the remains of Ailsa, her body buried below its base.

The story is told, in the third person, by Greg Taylor, the head gamekeeper at the estate, and his new girlfriend, Joanne Addington, newly arrived from London. Greg and Joanne have only recently met, he a little taken aback by her acceptance of his invitation to come to Blackrig. Both, it quickly becomes clear, have something to hide, Greg feeling guilty for what he sees as his part in introducing the virus into the village, Joanne hiding from something, or someone, back in London. But do either, or both, of them have deeper secrets to hide?

Lin Anderson draws very realistic relatable characters. Both main characters are flawed, are hiding things from each other. The newness of their relationship and their, understandable though frustrating, reluctance to share their thoughts, leads to tension between them. The arrival of Greg’s egotistic boss and of the police investigating Ailsa’s death intensifies the tension. Greg, with all of the men who were in the village when Ailsa disappeared, is once again under suspicion. His tendency to lose his temper makes Joanne question the speed in which they became entangled, as does Greg’s ex’s obvious dislike of her.

The book is very evocative of the highlands near Inverness. Lin Anderson perfectly captures the uniqueness of remote communities and the wariness towards outsiders. THE PARTY HOUSE is one of the first novels I have read to describe the devastating impact of Covid 19, the effects continuing even as the village emerges from lockdown measures. The book is thrilling, the tension slowly building to a stunning conclusion. I enjoyed it tremendously and look forward to exploring the author’s Scotland set Rhona MacCloud series of crime novels.

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Lin Anderson is a Scottish author and screenwriter known for her bestselling crime series featuring forensic scientist Dr Rhona MacCloud. Four of her novels have been long listed for the Scottish Crime Book of the Year, with FOLLOW THE DEAD being a 2018 finalist. Her short film River Child won both a Scottish BAFTA for Best Fiction and the Celtic Film Festival’s Best Drama Award and has now been viewed more than one million times on YouTube. Lin is also the co-founder of the international crime writing festival Bloody Scotland.

#BlogTour - Cold, Cold Bones by Kathy Reichs

Sometimes, revisiting the past is the only way to rescue the present . . . 

Winter has come to North Carolina and, with it, a drop in crime. For a while, temporarily idle forensic anthropologist Tempe Brennan is content to dote on her daughter Katy, finally returned to civilian life from the army. But when mother and daughter meet at Tempe’s place one night for dinner, they find a box on the back porch. Inside: a very fresh human eyeball.

 

GPS coordinates etched into the eyeball lead to a Benedictine Monastery where an equally macabre discovery awaits. Soon after, Tempe examines a mummified corpse in a state park, and her anxiety deepens. 

There seems to be no pattern to these random killings, except that each mimics in some way a killing that a younger Tempe witnessed, analysed, or barely escaped. 

Who or what is targeting her, and why? 

Helping Tempe discover the answers is Detective Erskine 'Skinny' Slidell, retired but still volunteering with the CMPD cold case unit - and still displaying his gallows humour. But as the two infiltrate a bizarre survivalist’s lair, even Skinny’s mood darkens. 

And then Tempe’s daughter Katy disappears.

Electrifying, heart-stopping and compulsive, this is Tempe’s most personal and dangerous case yet . . . 

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COLD, COLD BONES is the 21^st novel in Kathy Reichs’ Temperance Brennan series, and the first I have read. I am usually loathe to jump into the middle of a series, particularly one so long-running, but I didn’t feel lost and the novel can absolutely be read as a standalone. Temperance Brennan is a forensic anthropologist who helps police investigations by studying the bones of the deceased. She has a grown daughter, Katy, who has just returned from her second tour of duty in the United States Army and Tempe is helping Katy set up her own place. I felt that I got to know the characters very quickly, the slight tension between the mother and her adult daughter. Tempe narrates the story and Kathy Reichs writes her in a very conversational, familiar way; she addresses the reader directly, as a confidant; ‘You get the picture…’

When Tempe finds a human eyeball in a package left on her doorstep, a startling enough discovery, she finds map coordinates etched in miniature on the surface, coordinates which lead her and, retired, cold case detective, Skinny Slidell to the location of a head which went missing from a dodgy crematorium a few years earlier. Then a mummified corpse is found hanging from a tree, in circumstances which echo a previous investigation in which Tempe was involved. Tempe begins to suspect that someone is intentionally mimicking her previous cases to target her.

Not having read any of Kathy Reichs’ previous work, I am unsure whether the echoed murders are those that constant readers are familiar with, but, again, my enjoyment was unimpaired as Tempe recalls each, initially with some confusion and then growing anxiety when it becomes clearer that the killer is targeting not only Tempe but also those close to her.

COLD, COLD BONES is an exciting and thrilling mystery. I enjoyed the characters, particularly the relationship between Tempe and Skinny. The crimes reminded me of the likes of the movie Seven. There is some body horror, macabre humour, particularly from Skinny, and just enough red herrings and assorted creepy suspects to keep the reader guessing. The novel works because of the skill in which Kathy Reichs writes Temperance Brennan. This may well be a series I have to go to the beginning of…

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About the Author 

Kathy Reichs’s first novel Déjà Dead, published in 1997, won the Ellis Award for Best First Novel and was an international bestseller. Kathy was also a producer of Fox Television’s longest running scripted drama Bones, which is based on her work and her novels. Kathy uses her own dramatic experiences as a forensic anthropologist to bring her mesmerizing thrillers to life. One of very few forensic anthropologists certified by the American Board of Forensic Anthropology, Kathy divides her time between Charlotte, North Carolina, and Montreal, Québec.

Thanks to @RandomTTours, @simonschusterUK, @Tr4cyF3nt0n, and @KathyReichs

 

#BlogTour - All I Said Was True by Imran Mahmood

When Amy Blahn was murdered on a London office rooftop, Layla Mahoney was there. She held Amy as she died. But all she can say when police arrest her is that ‘It was Michael. Find Michael and you’ll find out everything you need to know.’ 

The problem is, the police can’t find Michael – there is no evidence that he exists. And time is running out before they have to either charge Layla with Amy’s murder, or let her go. 

As a lawyer, Layla knows that she has only forty-eight hours to convince police to investigate the man she knows only as ‘Michael’ instead of her. But the more she attempts to control her interviews with police, the more the truth leaks out – and how much of that truth can Layla risk being exposed? 

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‘Every one of the billions of stars and planets - every single one is just cause and effect. They exist in their current states because of the things that happened beforehand. Do you think you’re immune from cause and effect, but whole galaxies aren’t?’

Imran Mahmoud’s third novel, ALL I SAID WAS TRUE, is narrated by Layla Mahoney, a personal injury lawyer, being questioned by police in connection with the murder of Amy Blahn. Layla’s story unfolds NOW, as she is interrogated by detectives who have 48 hours in which to decide whether to charge her, and THEN, as we find out how she came to on the roof of her husband’s workplace cradling the dead body of a woman whom she claims not to know, and, in particular, her strange relationship with a man called Michael, a man she claims is really responsible. 

As with the protagonists of Mahmood’s previous novels, YOU DON’T KNOW ME and I KNOW WHAT I SAW, Layla is an unusual, perhaps unreliable, narrator. It is clear from the start of her interrogation that Layla knows more than she initially offers, that she seems to be giving up her information to a planned timetable. She maintains that Michael killed Amy but the police cannot find any evidence that Michael was on the roof, or that he actually exists. THEN, Layla tells us that Michael saved her from being run over by an out of control car on a London street. Thereafter, Michael appears at intervals, claiming that he has not been following Layla, that their meetings are not coincidental, that they are in fact linked in some way, that they are intended to prevent some terrible occurrence. At times the reader might question whether there is something supernatural going on here, or Michael may just be a liar who Is following her…

‘And then there’s this one immovable fact - I can’t face a murder charge. I didn’t do it. But there’s a danger in saying too much which would be worse for me that a murder trial.’

Imran Mahmood is clearly the master of unconventional narrators. Layla is a complex character; we know she is withholding information from both her interrogators and from us as readers, that she is playing some longer game,  but she also appears to have episodes when she is unsure of herself, when she questions the reality of what she sees, when she makes very questionable decisions. And yet, Layla is entirely relatable and three-dimensional. There is a lot going on in ALL I SAID WAS TRUE and, like Layla, Mahmood gives us just enough information to keep us on tenter hooks while keeping the big reveals until later. It is a delicate balance but it really works. ALL I SAID WAS TRUE builds on the craft of the author’s previous novels, honing it to an even sharper edge; a thoroughly entertaining mystery.

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Imran Mahmood is a practising barrister with thirty years’ experience fighting cases in courtrooms across the country. His debut novel You Don’t Know Me was chosen by Simon Mayo as a BBC Radio 2 Book Club Choice for 2017 and longlisted for Theakston Crime Novel of the Year and for the CWA Gold Dagger, and was made into a hugely successful BBC1 adaptation in association with Netflix. His second novel I Know What I Saw was released in June 2021, was chosen as a Sunday Times crime novel of the month and reached no. 2 on the Audible charts. He has been commissioned to write three screenplays and is working on his next novel. When not in court or writing novels or screenplays he can sometimes be found on the Red Hot Chilli Writers’ podcast as one of the regular contributors. He hails from Liverpool but now lives in London with his wife and daughters. @imranmahmood777