Review: The Ex by Alafair Burke

The Ex by Alafair Burke

Publisher: Faber & Faber

Release date: 4 February 2016

Rating: **** and a half

Back cover blurb: Olivia Randall is one of New York City’s best criminal defense lawyers. When she hears that her former fiancé, Jack Harris, has been arrested for a triple homicide—and that one of the victims was connected to his wife’s murder three years earlier—there is no doubt in her mind as to his innocence. The only question is, who would go to such great lengths to frame him—and why? For Olivia, representing Jack is a way to make up for past regrets and absolve herself of guilt from a tragic decision, a secret she has held for twenty years. But as the evidence against him mounts, she is forced to confront her doubts. The man she knew could not have done this. But what if she never really knew him?

The Ex is a legal thriller and the first of Alafair Burke's novels that I have read - it won't be the last.

Jack Harris is a lonely widower with a teenage daughter. He has immersed himself in his work as an author, and he has tried desperately to move on with his life after the loss of his wife in a fatal shooting years earlier. 

Largely, he has succeeded, but he has yet to find love again.

When his eye is caught by a lonely stranger on a morning jog, Jack's best friend Charlotte is eager to help Jack find the elusive woman. But on the morning he sets out to meet her, he instead find himself at the Police station under investigation after three people are shot dead in a New York park.

At first glance the motive is strong, one of the victims was involved in the shooting that killed Jack's wife Molly. Jack's daughter calls upon a local lawyer to help her Dad out, certain that he should not be the one in trouble.

Olivia Randall is the high profile successful criminal defense lawyer, bought in to assist Jack, who just happens to be an ex-girlfriend who broke his heart.

Both Olivia and Jack have changed since they were together, but Olivia knows Jack inside out...  knows that he is not capable of one murder, let alone three, and is determined to help clear his name.

As the investigation into the shootings continues Olivia is forced to ask herself if she really knows Jack at all.

And if she doesn't, then what exactly is she getting herself in to...

The Ex is available now from Amazon online and Faber and Faber. 

    

Thank you to the publishers who provided me with an advance copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Review: the Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson

The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson Publisher: Faber and Faber Release date: 3 September 2015 Rating: ***** Back cover blurb: ‘Hello there.’ I looked at the pale, freckled hand on the back of the empty bar seat next to me in the business class lounge of Heathrow airport, then up into the stranger’s face. ‘Do I know you?’ 


                      The Kind Worth Killing has been shortlisted for the CWA Ian Fleming Dagger Ward, you don't have to read very far into this beauty of a novel to understand why.

It's a novel that has been sitting on my ‘to be read’ list for a while, and as soon as I started it I could've literally kicked myself for not reading it sooner... Also any author who has had their work endorsed by the genius that is Nelson DeMille is surely worth a read.

The Kind Worth Killing opens with Ted Severson meeting Lily Kintner at London Heathrow airport both are waiting for a flight to Boston. From the outset Lily is charming, beautiful and manipulative; enticing details from Ted that you wouldn't normally impart to a stranger, yet revealing very little about herself. Once their flight is delayed, Ted finds himself opening up to Lily even more, and she is sympathetic to his plight.

Ted is a wealthy man whose wife is cheating on him with Brad Daggett the man who is helping them construct their dream home. Ted is angry, but unsure what he should do and jokingly hints as killing her. 
Lily thinks that Miranda is after his money, and is the ‘kind worth killing’, she is blasé about the subject of murder; "Truthfully, I don't think murder is necessarily as bad as people make it out to be. Everyone dies. What difference does it make if a few bad apples get pushed along a little sooner than God intended? And your wife, for example, seems like the kind worth killing."

What follows is a series of flashbacks, For those who love a twist, there is a brilliant one about mid-way through this novel which I didn't see coming at all, and it really added to my enjoyment of the novel.

The characters in this novel at sociopaths at best, psychopaths at worst, I should hate them all - but there is something very intriguing about both Ted and Lily and I would love to see another novel with Lily Kintner as a character.

 
The Kind Worth Killing is a must read for crime/thriller fans, and comes highly recommended from me! I'm off now to scout out Peter Swanson's first novel, whilst kicking myself for missing it...

The Kind Worth Killing is available to buy now from Amazon online and all good book shops. 
 
A huge thank you to Dead Good books for allowing me to receive a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review. 

Review: the Girl in the Red coat by Kate Hamer

The Girl in the Red Coat by Kate Hamer

Publisher: Faber and Faber

Release date: 26 February 2015
Rating: ****

Back cover blurb: Eight-year-old Carmel has always been different - sensitive, distracted, with an heartstopping tendency to go missing. Her mother Beth, newly single, worries about her daughter's strangeness, especially as she is trying to rebuild a life for the two of them on her own. When she takes Carmel for an outing to a local festival, her worst fear is realised: Carmel disappears into the crowd. Unable to accept the possibility that her daughter might be gone for good, Beth embarks on a mission to find her. Meanwhile, Carmel begins an extraordinary and terrifying journey of her own. But do the real clues to Carmel's disappearance lie in the otherworldly qualities her mother had only begun to guess.

 

 

 

 

The Girl in the Red coat is an intriguing debut novel and Kate Hamer certainly knows how to keep the reader engaged. That said, I did find that I had to read the novel in large chunks or risk losing the plot slightly.

Carmel- the eight year old girl at the centre of the story, is a wonderful character, who often seems older than her years. Carmel's mother Beth, is a notorious worrier (in Carmel's eyes) and is often telling Carmel off for going 'missing' (hiding in mazes, under tables etc).

 

Beth is left bereft when her daughter goes missing at a literary festival and fears the worst. Carmel has been persuaded to leave with a man who tells her he is her grandfather and that her mother has been in a terrible accident, and left him to look after her.

What follows is a mother's tale of grief, anger and hope, and a little girls tale of strange new surroundings and lies about her family and future.

I loved that the story was told from both mother and daughter's perspective as it really helps us to get inside the characters heads.

Without giving too much away, the scary thing about the Girl in the Red coat, is that it is entirely plausible. The idea that another human being, male or female becomes so fixated with the crusade that they are on, that they are no longer in touch with the real world.

At first, I thought that the novel was going down a much darker path than I had anticipated, thankfully it didn't. 

 

I was more than happy with the ending (although disappointed that the novel had ended so abruptly) as it gives hope to families with missing children, and reiterates that not all who take children from their families do so with the intent of harming them. 

Indeed some believe that they are taking them for absolutely the right reasons and that they are going to a better place where they can give them a better life than the one they are currently living.

 

The Girl in the Red Coat is available to pre-order now from Amazon online and Faber. 
    Thank you to the publishers who approved my request via netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Dark Tides by Chris Ewan

Dark Tides by Chris Ewan
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Release date: Oct 16 2014   
Rating: ****

Back cover blurb: A stunning new thriller from the bestselling author of Safe House. When Claire Cooper was eight years old her mother mysteriously vanished during Hop-tu-naa, the Manx Halloween. At fourteen, Claire is still struggling to come to terms with her disappearance when she's befriended by a group of five teenagers who mark every Hop-tu-naa by performing dares.But Claire's arrival begins to alter the group's dynamic until one year a prank goes terribly wrong, changing all their futures and tearing the friends apart. Six years later, one of the friends is killed on Hop-tu-naa in an apparent accident. But Claire, now a police officer, has her doubts. Is a single footprint found near the body a deliberate taunt? As another Hop-tu-naa dawns, bringing with it another death and another footprint, Claire becomes convinced that somebody is seeking vengeance.. Contd...

   

So Chris Ewan was an author I'd not had the pleasure of reading up until my recent trip abroad, and I have to admit that I initially found the novel quite slow to get in to. However, by the end of the novel I was gripped. AND - I almost had the correct suspect, but not quite!

Our protagonist, Claire Cooper, could have grown up to be a disturbed individual after the disappearance of her mother when she was young, and her involvement with a group of people that from the outside, were so different from her, that they could only cause her trouble.

 

But we often make awkward decisions as a teenager for the sake of friendship. And for Claire getting involved with a group of teenagers who celebrate every Hop-tu-naa (Manx Halloween) with a challenging dare, the lure was too hard to resist.

Hop-tu-naa has a special significance for Claire as its the very evening that her Mother disappeared. When her new found friends get wind of this, they want to take revenge of those who they believe are truly resposible for the event.

 

The night is remembered for all of the wrong reasons and has consequences even years later that none of them could have foreseen.

 

Fast forward to the present day and Claire is a trusted member of her local community, a police officer, a truly good person, which shows in her chosen professional though you may query if she chose it out of guilt or whether she was just looking for answers regarding her mother.

It's not until Claire's friends start dying in 'accidents' (that no one can explain), one by one that the novel starts to get really interesting and from this point on I was hooked. Is someone after revenge for 'the' fateful Hop-tu-naa night of the past, or is it just a series of coincidences. Claire knows that she must find out and risks her life (and career) in doing so.

 

Dark Tides is available to buy from 16 October 2014.

 

 

 

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