Review - the Drowning Place by Sarah Hilary

The Drowning Place

Publisher: Vintage

Release date: 16 April 2026

Back cover blurb: Every place has its ghosts. Edenscar, a town in the Peak District, has more than most. 17 years ago, its inhabitants were hit by tragedy when a school bus veered off the road and everyone on board drowned. Everyone, that is, except Joseph Ashe. His miraculous survival has haunted him and the town ever since. Now a Detective Sergeant in the local police, Joe is called to the scene of a brutal and apparently inexplicable crime. The whole town is spooked, but Joe’s new boss, DI Laurie Bower, more used to inner-city police work, has no time for superstition. She just wants to find the very real killer who has left no trace and apparently had no motive. Joining forces, Joe and Laurie work to uncover the secrets of Edenscar, both past and present. But when you dig up the dead, expect to get your hands dirty…

The Drowning Place is one of the best crime novels that I've had the pleasure of reading recently. Sarah Hilary never disappoints!

I also love an unpredictable novel, and this is certainly that. There is a brilliant twist at the end that I didn't see coming - and I read a lot of crime! 

Seventeen years ago Joseph Ashe was on a school coach with his best friends when the bus careered off the road in the most tragic accident Edenscar had ever seen. It was a fatal accident, and Joseph was the sole survivor, and has lived with the guilt ever since.

Now a Detective Sergeant, Joseph is good at his job, but it still haunted by the past. Sometimes literally. For he sees the victims, his friends, as clearly as if they were still alive. Edenscar is a small community and everyone knows Joseph, and some are thankful for his 'gift', some not so.

Detective Inspector Laurie Bower is not local to Edenscar, but she has moved to the area temporarily to support her husband, who has returned to the area to support his sisters in looking after his Father who is in the early stages of dementia.

DI Bower is used to the hustle and bustle of the City and is worried that Edenscar is not going to be able to hold her attention, particularly when it comes to work. She has been temporarily transferred to Edenscar, where she will be working alongside DS Ashe.

She needed have worried, within 24 hours of her arrival there is a major incident, and she must quickly earn the trust of those around her to enable her to do her job effectively. As with any rural community they are naturally suspicious of outsiders so Laurie has her work cut out for her.

At first she struggles to work with Joe, she finds him closed off and hard to read, but then she learns that they are both dealing with ghosts of the pasts, and must find a way forward together so that they can deal with the present.

This is a beautifully twisty crime novel, and the first of two (I think) in a DS Ashe series, and I really look forward to the next installment. 

The Drowning Place is available now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - Adrift by Will Dean

Adrift by Will Dean
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Release date: 19 February 2026

Back cover blurb: Three of them adrift on the narrowboat. Mother, son, and wickedness. Peggy Jenkins and her teenage son, Samson, live on a remote stretch of canal in the Midlands. She is a writer and he is a schoolboy. Together, they battle against the hardness and manipulation of the man they live with. To the outside world he is a husband and father. To them, he is a captor. Their lives are tightly controlled; if any perceived threat appears, their mooring is moved further down the canal, further away from civilisation. Until the day when the power suddenly shifts, and nothing can be the same again.

I've read a few of Will Dean's books now and I think Adrift is definitely my favourite. I love that his books are all so very different, and this is one no exception.

Teenage Samson, his Mother, Peggy and his Father, Drew live on a narrowboat, on a remote stretch of Canal in the Midlands. 

Hidden from the view of any prying eyes, which is exactly what Drew wants for them. Drew is an award winning writer, who insists on complete peace and quiet for working during night hours.

Samson is bullied at school because his family dares to be different, and it is a daily battle for him to survive, in more ways than one.

Drew is used to getting his own way, to being the one in charge, making it clear that his family could not possibly survive without him.

Peggy uses writing herself as an escape from reality, but hides this from her husband until she thinks that she might be able to use it as an actual escape. The path to a new life for her and Samson.

Unfortunately Drew's reaction is worse than she could have anticipated and so the fight for survival really begins..

 

Adrift is available now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - the Shock of the Light by Lori Inglis Hall

The Shock of the Light by Lori Inglis Hall
Publisher: The Borough Press
Release date: 12 February 2026

Back cover blurb: Cambridge, 1942. Twins Tessa and Theo had always shared everything – until the summer Tessa spent studying in France. She hasn’t been the same since. But before Theo can find out why, he is recruited by the RAF and disappears into the skies. Determined to carve her own path, Tessa joins the clandestine Special Operations Executive, slipping into the shadows of occupied France. It will be dangerous work, but France is the home of her greatest love – and her darkest secret. Tessa has many reasons for wanting to return. Two years later, only one of them comes home.

Twins, Tessa and Theo have been inseparable since they can remember, until the summer that Tessa spent studying at the Sorbonne in Paris. They were both supposed to study at Cambridge, until Tessa changed her mind at the last minute.

The space between only widens with the arrival of WW2. 

Theo signs up to the RAF, despite his Father's pacifist beliefs and Tessa is working for the government in a different way, though not the way she wants to be.

As a typist in a typing pool she doesn't think she is being used to her full potential. Luckily the powers that be agree, and Tessa is signed up as an SOE operative. She knows that the work is dangerous, but is determined to do her bit for the war effort.

As soon as she lands in occupied France she realises that she may have bitten off more than she can chew.

Theo meanwhile is flying above Europe in Battles testing his strength and ability. After suffering an injury that forces him home to his parents they discover together the news that Tessa is missing, presumed dead, but they don't understand how or why this was allowed to happen.

Theo, now resigned to a desk job is determined to find out what has happened to his Sister, especially as no one seems to want to talk about her disappearance. He knows that something is not right, but isn't prepared for the harsh reality.

Could his Sister really be responsible for the things that they are saying? Theo doesn't believe so, but he knows that Tessa changed when she came back from the Sorbonne, and things were never quite the same. 

Did he ever really know his sister at all?

This is an absolutely beautifully written novel, and is definitely one of my favourites of 2026 so far.

The Shock of the Light is available now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - the League of Lonely War Women by Andie Newton

The League of Lonely War Women by Andie Newton

Publisher: One More Chapter

Release date: 20 February 2026

Back cover blurb: ‘A woman can get more information about German supply lines and replacements than a man with a knife to a soldier’s throat…’ Germany, 1944. Best friends Vivien Allen and Junie Knight are part of the covert world of America’s Morale Operations branch. As members of The League of Lonely War Women, a dark propaganda campaign aimed to sow seeds of doubt in German soldiers’ minds, their first mission sends them deep into enemy territory. But their mission isn’t exactly what was sold to them, and the tracking of a dangerous SS officer goes very wrong, their friendship is irreparably broken. Now, ten years later, Viv is still paying the consequences, so when a chance at redemption lands in her lap she seizes it, determined to right past wrongs, reconcile with Junie, and complete her mission once and for all…

OSS operatives Viv and Junie are the best of friends. Dot and Pudge the same. They meet for the first time in exceptional circumstances, undercover on a mission where they must earn the trust of German soldiers so that they can gather intelligence.

Viv and Pudge are put together on a side mission, one that they mustn't disclose to anyone including their friends and colleagues. They must track a very dangerous SS office and ensure that he is captured.

The mission doesn't go to plan, and their lives endangered when when of the women they are working with on the ground is captured. Feeling they have failed in their mission, the four of them leave the area together and await further instruction.

But their friendship is fragile, and trust broken, by secrets and missions that can't be spoken about.

Fast forward ten years later and Viv is happily married to Hal. Working as a Private Investigator catching unsuspecting husbands cheating on their wives. She doesn't realise that she wants more until she receives a postcard from pudge with three words. 

'I've found him'.

She immediately finds her old boss, Cora at the CIA building and demands to be put back on the case. Cora isn't on side, says its not that simple, and the American government are actually more interested in suspected communists than former Nazi's these days.

But Viv knows that isn't the reality, so she and Pudge work behind the scenes to get the old team back together, and capture the former SS Officer Engel once and for all.

The League of Lonely War Women is available to pre-order now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - the Burning Library by Gilly Macmillan

The Burning Library by Gilly Macmillan

Publisher: John Murray Press

Release date: 29 January 2026

Back cover blurb: For over a century two rival organisations of women have gone to deadly lengths to secure a precious scrap of fraying embroidery in the hopes of finding the original medieval manuscript from which it was torn. There's the Order of St Katherine: devoted to the belief that women must pull strings in the shadows in order to exercise covert control. And the Fellowship of the Larks: determined to amass as many overt positions of power for women as possible . . . while making sure their methods never come to light. When trailblazing paleographer Dr Anya Brown is headhunted by the exclusive Institute of Manuscript Studies at St Andrews, she's unaware that she is in grave danger - her new employers are the Larks, and they'll stop at nothing to achieve their mission. As Dr Brown is drawn deeper into this ancient web, events spiral beyond her control. To uncover the truth, and escape with her life, she must summon all her expertise to decipher a series of messages that have lain hidden for centuries.

The Burning Library isn't like Gilly Macmillan's previous novels if you are a follower of her work. But it is a a brilliant novel nonetheless. 

Dr Anya Brown thinks she is happy in her current role, having done some really important work in the filed of palaeography. 

That is until she is offered the chance of a lifetime, the opportunity to join the Institute of Manuscript studies.

But the Institute have an ulterior motive for inviting her.

As far back as anyone is able to recall, there have been two secret female societies who have embedded themselves firmly into other societies (WI, elite universities etc). Both are trying to recover a priceless item that has been lost for years.

Both will do anything to recover it.

Including murder.

The Institute of Manuscript studies is the perfect place for a member of either society to hide in plain sight. 

This novel does require a high level of concentration, but it is definitely worth it.

The Burning Library is available to pre-order now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - Very Slowly All at Once by Lauren Schott

Very Slowly All at Once by Lauren Schott

Publisher: HQ

Release date: 29 January 2026

Back cover blurb: Mack and Hailey Evans are on the cusp of living the American Dream. Established careers, two beautiful children, and a new house on a coveted lakefront estate. But modern life is expensive, so the anonymous payments they start to receive are spent before they know it. Could this money be from Mack's estranged father? Or one of Hailey's clients? Does it really matter? Then they discover that this mysterious benefactor expects a return on their investment. How far will the couple have to go to pay them back? As it turns out, the best things in life are not free. And the price is far steeper than they could have imagined …

I really really adored this book until it's final pages when I realised that there wasn't going to be a satisfying conclusion. It was then I realised that I also didn't truly understand the real reason behind the criminal campaign at this novel's heart. 

Though some might argue it's obvious, to me there were still a lot of unanswered questions...

Mack and Hailey are happily married. Whatever that means... with two young daughters and a dog. They are a couple that appear to have it all. 

A fancy house in the most desirable part of town, the ultimate professional careers; Hailey a hot shot divorce lawyer and Mack a highly respected University professor.

But nothing is ever as perfect as it seems on the outside, and Mack is silently fighting an harassment battle claim that his wife knows nothing about. Hailey, the most difficult case of her career to date.

Then, all of their dreams seemingly come true when a cheque comes through the mail, unidentifiable. Mack only hesitates for the smallest moment before casing it, thinking it will buy him some time should the unthinkable happen and he loses his job.

Mack assumes its a one off, maybe a mistake, but the cheques keep coming, whilst everything around him continues to fall apart.

And then the threats start. 

Pay back the money that's been cashed, or things will get nasty. And no one wants that...

Very Slowly All at Once is available to pre-order now via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review - So, I Met This Guy... by Alexandra Potter

So, I Met This Guy by Alexandra Potter

Publisher: Pan Macmillan

Release date: 29 January 2026

Back cover blurb: So, I Met This Guy... Well, isn’t that how every love story starts? But how does it end – a happily ever after? Or with the discovery that the supposed love-of-your-life has stolen your life savings and your home, trashed your heart and demolished your self-esteem? Maggie is barely fifty years-old, and she's not one to give up on herself. So when she meets Flick, a young reporter who realizes this story could be the big break she’s been looking for, they set off to catch him as he goes on the run across Europe. After all, she’s got nothing left to lose, right? But as the pair embark on the road trip of their lives, unexpected twists, hidden secrets and hard truths are revealed. And as an unlikely friendship begins to blossom, they realize it’s not just about finding the guy, it’s about finding themselves... From the author of the mega bestseller Confessions of a Fortysomething F##k Up comes another laugh-out-loud novel full of wit, wisdom . . . and women who have had ENOUGH.

How many times have we females started a conversation with, "So I met this guy"? 

Maggie unfortunately thought she had met 'the One'. Even though she wasn't actually looking for anything, but isn't that always the way.

She was completely blindsided by Theo, a total charmer. Who unfortunately scammed her out of her life savings, leaving her with nothing.

Flick, a local newspaper reporter who has dreams of becoming a 'proper' journalist has gotten wind of Maggie's plight and wants to do an article on 'Romance Scammers'. With an ulterior motive...

Maggie reluctantly agrees, and the pair find themselves by accident, or coincidence, neither of them is really sure.. on a whirlwind trip across Europe, following Theo to try and confront him so that he can be arrested and finally made to pay for his crimes.

Can they bring him to justice?

You'll have to read to find out.. 

Buckle up, it's a bumpy, but hugely enjoyable ride!

So, I Met This Guy is available to pre-order via Amazon online and all good book shops.

Thank You to the publishers who approved my request via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.