Tag: mystery

‘The Appeal’ by Janice Hallett

Happy publication day to this fabulous crime story with a difference! With thanks to Viper Books for my gifted copy and my buddy reader, Locky Loves Books, for lots of chat along the way.

Although the book was given to me by the publisher, opinions are entirely my own.

From the Publisher:

Someone was murdered.
Someone went to prison.
And everyone’s a suspect.
Can you uncover the truth?


Dear Reader,


Enclosed are documents relating to the events surrounding the Fairway Players’ staging of All My Sons, and the tragic death of one of its members. Another member is currently in prison for the crime. We have reason to suspect that they are innocent, and that there were far darker secrets that have yet to be revealed.


We believe that the killer has given themselves away. It’s there in writing, hidden in the emails, texts, and letters. In the events surrounding the charity appeal for little Poppy Reswick, and the question of whether that money was truly being used to fund her life-saving cancer treatment. Will you accept the challenge? Can you uncover the truth? Do you dare?


The Appeal by Janice Hallett is the standout debut thriller of 2021 in which the reader is challenged to solve the crime… and predict the victim. With the small-town intrigue of The Casual Vacancy and the deft plotting of Agatha Christie, it will change the way you think about the modern crime novel.


‘An addictive read’ – Michelle Frances
‘Brilliantly original, inventive and clever’ – Phoebe Morgan


TV RIGHTS OPTIONED BY ABC STUDIOS

My Review:

Look at that strapline! ‘Someone was murdered. Someone went to prison. And everyone’s a suspect. Can you uncover the truth?’ What an intriguing prospect! I volunteered to read the book based on that alone, with absolutely no sense of what the book was actually about. Indeed, I assumed the appeal of the title was something…legal-ish?

It turns out that ‘The Appeal’ is actually about a fundraising appeal to provide medication for a sick child, Poppy Reswick. The story of the appeal and the community undertaking this charitable venture is told through a series of letters, notes, texts, transcripts and voicemails between the key players. Alongside this main focus, a lot of the community also form the theatrical group rehearsing for a production of ‘All My Sons’ by Arthur Miller and a further sub-set are involved in the local healthcare system. Some are long-term members of the community or deeply embedded in family networks, while others are more peripheral – work colleagues, members of the Fairway Players or friends.

It’s these overlapping stories and characters that form the thrust of this book – yes, there’s a murder, but the main part of the book is getting to know the characters and the events that lead up to the killing. The reader (along with two legal trainees, Femi and Charlotte) is left to read between the lines of the communications, make assumptions and judgements and try to work out what on earth was going on!

The characters are only ever seen through their own words (in the emails, etc.) and from the perspectives of the other characters. This immediately throws up lots of questions for us armchair sleuths. Isabel seems lovely and chatty so why isn’t she liked? How does SJ get away with being so blunt? Who is caught out in lies? Who is pretending to be something they aren’t? And who is causing enough friction to set themselves up as the murder victim?

The strapline asks ‘Can you uncover the truth?’ and – for me – the answer was a very definitive no! I enthusiastically took up every red herring, went off on all kinds of irrelevant tangents and totally missed some of the biggest clues. I would make a terrible detective, it turns out.

Still, I absolutely loved this book. I got so caught up in the lives of the Fairway Players, the appeal for Poppy, the petty jealousies and rivalries within the community, that the cast started to feel like people I actually knew!

I really loved the flashes of humour in the book too – some of the minor characters are very funny and Isabel’s notes of the committee meeting are hilarious. For anyone who has ever sat through committee meetings (or tried to document them), there is so much here that is relatable. All of life is here – the people taking offense, the sniping, the power struggles, the deception, the gossip. It felt like being thrown into a community and trying to work out who might be a good friend and who to watch out for – something I really enjoyed.

I’d highly recommend this book – it’s my first 5 star read of 2021 – and suggest that you too take up the challenge. Can you uncover the truth? You could not be worse at it than me and you’ll have a lot of fun along the way!

About the Author:

Janice Hallett is a former magazine editor, award-winning journalist, and government speechwriter. She co-wrote the psychological thriller feature film The Retreat (starring Cillian Murphy, Thandie Newton and Jamie Bell) with director Carl Tibbetts. She’s now a full-time writer of fiction in various forms, with several plays produced and scripts in development. The Appeal is her first novel.

My Top 10 Crime Fiction Books of 2020

I love crime fiction and there have been some brilliant books published in this genre in 2020! I’ll admit that I’m particularly partial to a police procedural and love a twisty crime thriller.

I have included only contemporary crime in this list – historical crime fiction features rather heavily on my top 10 historical novels of the year here.

Affiliate links are provided – thanks for supporting my blog with any purchases (at no extra cost to you).

Here are my top 10 crime novels of this year, starting at number 10…

10 – ‘Neon’ by G S Locke

This is serial killer thriller with a very unconventional detective duo who are working very much outside the law themselves! It’s an absolute page -turner set on the gritty streets of Birmingham – you can read my original review here.

9 – ‘Knife Edge’ by Simon Mayo

I wasn’t sure what to expect from Simon Mayo’s novel as I’m always a bit sceptical when people in the public eye turn to writing. However, I needn’t have been worried – this is a tense, tightly-plotted novel with terrorism at its fore. It keeps you reading from the very first pages when the first attacks take place in rush-hour London. You can read my full review here.


8 – ‘The Cutting Place’ by Jane Casey

I’m a huge fan of the DS Maeve Kerrigan series – this is the ninth book and I think could work as a stand alone (but why miss the other 8?!) This story is about uncovering corruption at the highest levels in society and it is another excellent police procedural. My review is here.

7 – ‘Their Silent Graves’ by Carla Kovach

This is the seventh book in the crime series featuring DI Gina Harte – I personally think this is one of the best in an always-excellent series. In this book (which I think could be read as a stand alone), Harte and her team are called in to investigate some particularly chilling Halloween murders in which a serial killer stalks the residents of a town. You can read my review here.

6 – ‘The Watcher’ by Kate Medina

I could not put this book down when I read it for a blog tour earlier in the year! It is gruesome, gritty and absolutely edge-of-your-seat tense. The story is about a killer who stalks their victims and leaves horrific crime scenes, but what I really loved was the fact that one of the investigators is a police psychologist, Dr Jessie Flynn. This gives a different flavour to the police procedural and I’m hoping Dr Flynn will feature in many more books. My review is here.

5 – ‘The Postscript Murders’ by Elly Griffiths

This one is a slightly cosier option than some of my other choices. In this, an unusual mix of characters come together to solve the killing of a ‘murder consultant’ who helps authors with their crime novels. I really enjoyed the combination of a cleverly-plotted murder mystery with the literary backdrop to it all. My original review can be read here.

4 – ‘Lost Cause’ by Rachel Lynch

This is the eighth instalment in the brilliant crime series featuring DI Kelly Porter and set in the Lake District. I think this is a high-point in a series that can always be relied upon to deliver solid police procedurals with plenty of twists. In this book, Porter and her team are investigating the brutal death of a woman whose abused body is found in a bin – but is she the only victim? It is grim and gritty but absolutely compelling. My review is here.

3 – ‘All Fall Down’ by M J Arlidge

In a kind of modern twist on the classic ‘A Murder is Announced’, victims are being warned of their own impending demise in a phone call. DI Helen Grace and her team are called in to investigate and begin to find connections to events eight years before. This is tense and twisty and really quite creepy – full review here.

2 – ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ by Richard Osman

This was a highly-anticipated debut from Richard Osman and I was charmed by this mystery set in a retirement village. Although the mystery plot was well handled, the real strength of this book was the characterisation and emotional punch. You can read my review here.

1 – ‘Broken Silence’ by Liz Mistry

This was one of those books that I was totally unprepared for – the pacing, the twists and the tension all totally took me by surprise and I loved it! It’s a gritty tale of Bradford’s criminal underworld featuring DS Nikki Parekh (who I loved) investigating the disappearance of a fellow police officer and I absolutely raced through it! Full review here.

Header photo by Maggie Yap on Unsplash.

Blog Tour: ‘Foul Play’ card game

Something a bit different on the blog today – a blog tour stop for a new murder mystery card game!

This blog tour has been arranged by Damp Pebbles Blog Tours – with thanks to After Dark for my copy of the game in exchange for an honest review. As always, opinions are entirely my own.

From the Game Creators:

FOUL PLAY

The Murder Mystery Card Game

The Manor House Murder

A game for 2 – 5 players | Age 14 +

£8.95 + p&p

www.foulplaygame.co.uk

Facebook : @afterdarkmystery | Twitter : @afterdarkmurder | Instagram : @afterdarkmurder

Email : info@afterdarkmurder.co.uk

The Game

Welcome to Edwardian England. The Lord of the Manor is dead! The servants are our lead suspects and it’s up to you to unearth the evidence, seek out the suspects and catch the culprit in order to scupper the other sleuths, and win this game of murder!

There’s more than one way to catch a killer though. So what’s it gonna be? Good Cop or Bad Cop? These two game versions come with their own set of rules and tactics to crack the case and finger your suspect, but will you use fair play or FOUL PLAY?

The Game is Afoot! Playing as detective, you’ll need to find the three evidence cards that point to a specific suspect in order to catch a killer in this crazy criminal caper. Will you uncover them in the crime scene? Could the other detectives be willing to collaborate and share their findings? Or will you resort to more tricky tactics, and plunder the proof you need to solve this crime?

History of Foul Play

What’s a Murder Mystery Events Company to do?

With a pandemic sweeping the nation and no sign of being able to perform their confounding criminal cabarets or incredible interactive investigations any time soon, they needed to come up with a plan, another way to provide mystery to the masses (and provide income to keep themselves afloat)!

Well, lockdown does strange things to people, especially actors who can’t go out and perform. So one fateful evening, Ben & Lee Cooper-Muir decided to come up with a whole new way to murder people. Keeping their cards close to their chests they plotted and schemed until Foul Play : The Murder Mystery Card Game was born. So, what to do next? This is where After Dark enters the picture. After all, Ben and Lee were two of the operators of the infamous murder mystery company. Maybe they could collaborate to bring the game to the masses. When Lockdown restrictions were eased a top-secret meeting was held with the other criminal masterminds behind After Dark, Helen Burrows, Sophie Webster & Tom Fisher and a pact was made. The game would be launched and licensed under the After Dark banner.  In true After Dark style, the team burst into action and then began the beta testing, design updates, promotional planning, character changes, proofing, proofing and more proofing until finally all the kinks were ironed out, mysteries solved, and FOUL PLAY came to life!

We hope you enjoy playing it, and although we all hope to be back performing soon, WATCH THIS SPACE! Now we know we can create and produce games we’ve got a lot more fun things planned for the future! 

My Review:

I jumped at the chance to review a murder mystery card game on my blog – my family love a game and Cluedo is a favourite so I hoped we would enjoy this one.

The premise is easy to understand – you either play the ‘good cop’ version where you race to find the culprit, or ‘bad cop’ mode where you try to frame anyone you can!

We played the first go through as a bit of a dummy run but that was all we needed – after this, even my 10 year-old took to the game quickly and had no problems following play. The trickiest bit was working out the playing space with the ‘crime scene’ and other piles of cards. We did find the ‘bad cop’ version a bit easier to follow for the children though as this was more about collecting combinations of cards and so a bit simpler than competing to deduce the single solution in the ‘good cop’ mode.

The game itself isn’t complicated but takes a bit of brain-work and following the cards held by other players – if you lose concentration then you are in for a frustrating time as you chase clues and try to avoid the useless red herrings!

The game cards are well made and the illustrations are appealing – I loved the range of culprits and the way that the clues gradually narrow them down based on their clothes, physical appearance and other items in their pictures.

We played mainly as a 3 – me and my 12 year-old son and 10 year-old daughter. This worked really well and we had a lot of fun stealing clues from each other, collaborating or passing off the dreaded red herrings. The game worked well as a game for 4 too on the occasion we managed to rope in my husband for a round.

The game is suggested for those aged 14+ but my children had no problems picking up the game and there was no unsuitable content – nothing they aren’t already familiar with through Cluedo, anyway. In fact, my daughter won every single game we have played so far which is either incredible luck or more skill than the rest of us have!

I’d recommend this as a fun family card game. It doesn’t take long to learn to play and I think it has plenty of scope for repeated playing – each round would be different and varied. It certainly was a winner with my family and will be a game we play many more times over this Christmas period.

Blog Tour: ‘Out for Blood’ by Deborah Masson

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘Out for Blood’ by Deborah Masson. This book will be released in paperback by Corgi on 10th December, 2020, but the e-book is available now.

This blog tour was organised by the fabulous Random Things Tours.

From the Publisher

THE RETURN OF DI EVE HUNTER: DI Eve Hunter is back in the edge-of-your-seat new detective thriller from Deborah Masson, winning author of the Bloody Scotland Crime Debut of the Year 2020.


A young man, the son of an influential businessman, is discovered dead in his central Aberdeen apartment.

Hours later, a teenaged girl with no identification is found hanged in a suspected suicide.


As DI Eve Hunter and her team investigate the two cases, they find themselves in a tug-of-war between privilege and poverty; between the elite and those on the fringes of society.


Then an unexpected breakthrough leads them to the shocking conclusion: that those in power have been at the top for too long – and now, someone is going to desperate lengths to bring them down…


Can they stop someone who is dead set on revenge, no matter the cost

READERS ARE OBSESSED WITH THE DI EVE HUNTER SERIES


‘Out For Blood has everything you need in a crime thriller and more’ – Rebecca Bradley


‘DI Eve Hunter is truly a force to be reckoned with’ – David Jackson


‘This is first-class crime fiction’ – Marion Todd


‘Not to be missed, edge-of-the-seat stuff from a genuine rising star’ – Denzil Meyrick


‘One of the best books I’ve ever read!’


‘I loved DI Eve Hunter and her team’


‘Without a doubt the best police procedural I have read in a long time’


‘I cannot wait to see what else is to come in the DI Eve Hunter series’


‘You won’t want to stop reading this addictive crime novel’


‘Fantastic characters that you’ll fall in love with – I really couldn’t put this book down!’


‘Can’t wait for the next one . . . and the next one . . . and the next one!

My Review

This is the second book in the series featuring DI Eve Hunter. I absolutely loved the first in the series – ‘Hold Your Tongue’ – and this is a worthy sequel.

The story opens with the death of a young man in a flat in an exclusive area of Aberdeen. At the same time, a young woman is found dead at a golf course in the city – it would appear to be a suicide, but there are some questions over the circumstances. DI Eve Hunter and her team are called in to investigate both deaths and start to make connections with some very powerful men and a previous police investigation.

I really liked the idea behind this novel – the fact that power at the highest level of society isn’t without corruption. This made for a compelling read as I was keen to find out what happened to the men in power and why.

DI Eve Hunter is an appealing and feisty protagonist – she has temper problems and doesn’t always have the best judgement which is refreshing and real. She has strength, but also she can be vulnerable, and her personal life doesn’t crowd out the crime story (as sometimes happens in police procedural series).

Another strength is DI Hunter’s team. They are also appealing and have identities in their own rights which is refreshing – too often, in books like this, the police team surrounding the main investigator tend to blend together, but this doesn’t happen here. They are individually interesting and likeable.

The story is well plotted and pacey – I was keen to race through to the end to find out what happened and was not disappointed at any point. It isn’t as gruesome as the first book in the series or quite as tense, but this didn’t detract from my enjoyment!

Overall, this is highly recommended to readers who enjoy a solid police procedural with a strong female lead. It’s perhaps not quite as edge-of-your-seat tense as the first one in the series, but it is engaging and compelling. I really look forward to the next one in the series.

About the Author:

Deborah Masson was born and bred in Aberdeen, Scotland. Always restless and fighting against being a responsible adult, she worked in several jobs including secretarial, marketing, reporting for the city’s freebie newspaper and a stint as a postie – to name but a few.


Through it all, she always read crime fiction and, when motherhood finally settled her into being an adult (maybe even a responsible one) she turned her hand to writing what she loved. Deborah started with short stories and flash fiction whilst her daughter napped and, when she later welcomed her son into the world, she decided to challenge her writing further through online courses with Professional Writing Academy and Faber Academy. Her debut novel, Hold Your Tongue, is the result of those courses.


Hold Your Tongue has been widely well reviewed by readers and authors alike, with many comparing her favourably to Stuart MacBride. It won the Bloody Scotland Scottish Crime Debut of the Year 2020 and was longlisted for CWA New Blood Dagger 2020.

Blog Tour: ‘The Wrong Sort to Die’ by Paula Harmon

Welcome to my stop on the Damp Pebbles blog tour for ‘The Wrong Sort to Die’ by Paula Harmon. This engaging and lively historical mystery was published by January Press in paperback and digital formats on 30th May 2020.

Book Blurb:

June 1910.


Fighting her corner in a man’s world, Dr Margaret Demeray works as a pathologist in a London hospital for the poor. Suppressing her worry that she’s breaching confidentiality, Margaret gives a stranger called Fox information about a dead down-and-out, in the hope he’ll use it to raise awareness of bad working conditions.

But when a second man appears to die the same way, Margaret starts to wonder why the enigmatic Fox keeps turning up to ask ever more complex questions.

She decides to work alone, uncertain of his motives and wary of her attraction to him. Once she starts investigating however, her home is burgled, she’s attacked in broad daylight and a close friend becomes distant. Fox offers the chance to forge an alliance, saying he knows why the men have died but needs her to find out what is killing them and who is behind it.

Yet how come the closer she gets to him the more danger she faces? And how can a memory she’d buried possibly be linked to the deaths?

Margaret must discover the truth before someone – known or unknown – silences her for good.

My Review:

I love a good mystery book. I also love historical fiction. Furthermore, I love a sassy and strong female protagonist, especially those pushing at societal boundaries, so choosing to read this book was a no-brainer for me!

I really loved the character of Dr Margaret Demeray who works as a pathologist in a London hospital for the poor – this was unknown for women at this time and it seemed a regular occurrence in the novel that men visited the hospital expecting to meet a male Doctor – it was frustrating to both Margaret and me that she was often treated as a nurse or some kind of helper!

When the death of what appears to be a rough-sleeper is brought to Margaret’s attention, she investigates his lungs for signs of disease as was common among those suffering poverty in London. However, she is mystified to find signs of another issue, almost a kind of poisoning of the tissue, and worries that it is caused by working conditions.

When another body is discovered with the same signs, Dr Margaret Demeray becomes embroiled in a mystery that proves dangerous to her personally. Her only ally seems to be a man called Fox, about whom she knows nothing other than he helps her out and keeps digging for information.

As Margaret is led into ever-more perilous situations, I couldn’t wait to turn the pages and race through the book to find out what happened. I really liked the fact that – although she faces some real danger – Margaret is a heroine that rarely needs saving by a man! Instead, she is tough and makes considered and thoughtful decisions – and she can see off an attacker if needed!

The plot is well-paced and the clues gradually begin to add up to something that is much beyond Margaret’s expectations. As the events of the novel began to race towards a denouement, I had everything crossed for Margaret! I wasn’t sure how the strands of the story would come together but they do – and well.

I would heartily recommend this to anyone who likes intelligent historical fiction with a crime and mystery element. This is no cosy crime – the diseased lungs and pathology put paid to that idea early on – but it is an engaging and lively novel with a heroine who is to be admired.

About Paula Harmon:

Paula Harmon writes chiefly but not only historical mysteries. Paula Harmon was born in North London to parents of English, Scottish and Irish descent. Perhaps feeling the need to add a Welsh connection, her father relocated the family every two years from country town to country town moving slowly westwards until they settled in South Wales when Paula was eight. She later graduated from Chichester University before making her home in Gloucestershire and then Dorset where she has lived since 2005.

She is a civil servant, married with two adult children. Paula started making up stories before she could write but didn’t take the plunge and do it seriously until 2015. Now she has several writing projects underway and wonders where the housework fairies are, because the house is a mess and she can’t think why.

Social Media:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paula_S_Harmon

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/paulaharmonwrites

Website: https://paulaharmon.com/

Amazon Author Page: https://amzn.to/37wEXzm

Purchase Links:

Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2TioPJu

Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2HsTwcg

Blog Tour: ‘The Chalet’ by Catherine Cooper

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘The Chalet’ by Catherine Cooper. This blog tour is organised by Random Things Tours. The book was published on 12th November, 2020 by Harper Collins.

With thanks to the blog tour host, author and publisher, as well as NetGalley, for my free review copy.

From the Publisher:

Four friends. One luxury getaway.


The perfect murder.


‘I was gripped from start to finish’ CASS GREEN


FRENCH ALPS, 1998
Two young men ski into a blizzard… but only one returns.


20 YEARS LATER
Four people connected to the missing man find themselves in that same resort.

Each has a secret.


Two may have blood on their hands. One is a killer-in-waiting. Someone knows what really happened that day.

And somebody will pay.


An exciting new debut for anyone who loves RUTH WARE, LUCY FOLEY, and C.L. TAYLOR.

My Review:

This felt like a strange book to be sitting down to at any time other than a bitter cold winter’s evening – a book set in a snowy ski resort and rooted in the treacherous conditions of a bitter blizzard!

Still, this was an engaging and pacy read that I devoured in one sitting – almost unheard of for me. It is really quite astounding that this is a debut novel from Catherine Cooper as it feels very assured.

The narrative moves between a tragedy in 1998 (when two brothers were lost in a snowstorm in the French Alps) and the modern day. Twenty years later, four friends hire a luxury chalet in the same French ski resort, but it soon becomes apparent that there are tensions under the surface and no-one is quite as they seem – and links back to the day the brothers got lost on the mountain begin to become evident.

Many of the characters are quite unpleasant, but this makes for an interesting and toxic environment and the luxury chalet soon becomes a claustrophobic nightmare.

The characters are all well developed and have their parts to play in the narrative. Ria seems to dislike her husband, Hugo, and keeps her secrets well hidden. Hugo is trying to impress an obnoxious client, Simon, and his downtrodden wife, Cass. Chalet girl, Millie, is trying to keep their holiday on track and chalet owner, Cameron, is there to promote his business. All these characters thrown together, each presenting their own stories through first person narration, make for a twisty and engrossing story as it becomes clear that someone is seeking revenge for the 1998 events.

This reads as a confidently plotted novel with plenty of twists and turns. I am genuinely surprised that it is a debut as the plot strands are so cleverly woven together and the range of narrative voices well-handled.

I’d recommend this to anyone who enjoys psychological thrillers as we do get to see the workings of the minds of various characters and what has brought them to the French Alps. As secrets are revealed and lies are told, you will want to carry on reading into the night!

About the Author:

CATHERINE COOPER is a freelance journalist writing for many national
newspapers and magazines, specialising in travel. Most recently she has
written several ski pieces for the Guardian and is currently compiling a 50
best family holidays round up for the Telegraph. She also makes regular
appearances as a talking head on daytime TV. She lives in France with her
husband and two teenage children, and is a keen skier.

‘The Butcher of Berner Street’ by Alex Reeve

This is the third book in the series featuring Leo Stanhope, a hospital porter turned journalist living with a big secret that could jeopardise everything he has worked for. This series, set in Victorian London, has been a treat from the beginning and this is another satisfying instalment.

This book will be published on 12th November, 2020.

This story follows Leo as he investigates a murder in a backstreet gaff, a low-rent wrestling venue packed with it’s own cast of tough men, dodgy management and street urchins looking for shelter. Leo, struggling to make his name on the front pages of the newspaper, writes an article that gets all the wrong sort of attention and finds himself caught up in something he cannot control or understand.

The story here is pacey and there are plenty of false turns and red herrings to keep readers guessing. The setting is appropriately seedy and the characters interesting.

What will appeal to readers returning to the series is the cast of Leo’s friends – Rosie and her pie shop, Alfie and Constance, Jacob and family, even the familiar Constable Pallett – who are all here.

This probably could be read as a stand alone novel, but I would really recommend that you start at the beginning of the series as there is so much to enjoy for lovers of historical fiction.

If you would like a copy of this book, please use my affiliate link below – thanks for supporting my blog! I’ve also added a link for ‘The House on Half Moon Street’ in case you wanted to start at the beginning of the series:

Header photo with thanks to SHOT for sharing their work on Unsplash.

Blog Tour: ‘The Phoenix Project’ by Michelle Kidd

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘The Phoenix Project’ by Michelle Kidd. This book was published on 5th October, 2018. The tour has been organised by Damp Pebbles Blog Tours.

This is the first book in the series featuring Detective Inspector Jack MacIntosh – there are two further books in the series: ‘Seven Days’ (Book 2) and ‘The Fifteen’ (Book 3).

The Blurb


How long can the past remain buried?

A simple message in a local newspaper. A set of highly sensitive documents left in the back of a London black cab. Both events collide to cause Isabel Faraday’s life to be turned upside down. Growing up believing her parents died in a car crash when she was five, Isabel learns the shocking truth; a truth that places her own life in danger by simply being a Faraday. Detective Inspector Jack MacIntosh of the Metropolitan Police races against time to save her, and at the same time unravels long forgotten secrets involving MI5, MI6, the KGB and NASA. Secrets that have lain dormant for twenty years. Secrets worth killing for. With kidnap, murder and suicides stretching across four continents, just what is the Phoenix Project?

The Phoenix Project is the first Detective Inspector Jack MacIntosh novel.

If you like a gripping page turner, with plenty of surprising twists, buy The Phoenix Project today to discover its secrets.

My Review

I’ll admit that this book was slightly outside my usual genres – although I love a police procedural, this one looked a lot more like a thriller and on an international scale so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

However, from the first page, it became evident that I was in safe hands as the story was revealed – multiple characters, many locations and different time periods were dealt with confidently by the author and I sat back to enjoy the ride!

I don’t think it can be emphasised enough that the scale of this book is HUGE. As well as involving MI5, MI6, NASA, the KGB and the Metropolitan Police, the story shifts between countries. The plot is also complex and on a massive scale with even an element about space travel. Although the premise initially seems a little far-fetched, it is absolutely compelling as the plot is developed around it. Although this was not within my usual genres, I found myself being pulled along by the story.

One of the ways that this book stays pacey and fresh across nearly 500 pages is the twists. Wow, the twists! There were so many that I felt like I was being pulled in so many directions and absolutely raced through the book in order to work out what was truth among the various plot strands featuring spies, double crosses, liars, corruption and secrecy!

In the middle of all this is DI Jack MacIntosh – we mainly follow his investigation and so discover things alongside him. He is an interesting character with a bit of back-story and I’d be interested to see how he develops in the rest of the series.

Also thrown into the middle of the mix is Isabel Faraday, a young woman working in an art supplies store who believes that her parents were killed in a car crash when she was a child. She receives a message to meet her ex-boyfriend, Miles, one evening and becomes central to the plot as she – along with the reader – tries to make sense of the bewildering events. I really liked Isabel as a character because she was surprisingly tough in the face of adversity and some very odd circumstances.

This is a hugely ambitious novel and one that I enjoyed very much, although I did sometimes feel that the plot was the driving force of the novel – I would have liked a little more character development in places as sometimes motives were not so clear. However, this is a minor quibble only as the plot is so fast-paced and twisty that there is never a dull moment.

I’d recommend this to those who like thrillers with a political dimension – although there is a central police figure, this is far from being a police procedural in the traditional sense. Instead, the reader is thrown into a whirl of people, places, plot twists and embarks on a race through the pages in order to discover the truth.

About the Author


Michelle Kidd is a self-published author known for the Detective Inspector Jack MacIntosh series of novels.

Michelle qualified as a lawyer in the early 1990s and spent the best part of ten years practising civil and criminal litigation.

But the dream to write books was never far from her mind and in 2008 she began writing the manuscript that would become the first DI Jack MacIntosh novel – The Phoenix Project. The book took eighteen months to write, but spent the next eight years gathering dust underneath the bed.

In 2018 Michelle self-published The Phoenix Project and had not looked back since. There are currently three DI Jack MacIntosh novels, with a fourth in progress.

Michelle works full time for the NHS and lives in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. She enjoys reading, wine and cats – not necessarily in that order.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuthorKidd
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michellekiddauthor
Website: https://www.michellekiddauthor.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michellekiddauthor/

Purchase Links

Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3nLLqMQ
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2IkU6Jz

WWW Wednesday: 4th November, 2020

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted at Taking on a World of Words. Anyone can take part and it is a great way of sharing what you have just finished reading, what you are currently reading and what is next on the TBR.

Links are provided for books already published – thanks for supporting my blog with any purchases (at no extra cost to you!)

What have you recently finished reading?

I finished my audiobook of ‘The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid’ which was written and read by Bill Bryson. I really enjoyed this autobiographical tale of Bryson’s childhood in Des Moines, Iowa, in the 1950s and would recommend it.

Then I read ‘The Devil and the Dark Water’ by Stuart Turton which I LOVED! It’s a dark and twisty tale of murder and mayhem on a ship travelling between the Dutch East Indies and Amsterdam in 1634. My review is here.

Lastly, I read ‘The Whole Truth’, the new DI Fawley book from Cara Hunter which is due out in March 2021. What starts as a he said/she said investigation into a sexual assault becomes something much more deadly for Fawley and his team. Review will follow in the blog nearer to the publication date.

What are you reading now?

I’m reading ‘The Wrong Sort to Die’ by Paula Harmon for a forthcoming blog tour. This is about a female doctor in 1910, a pioneering pathologist and one making her way in a man’s world. It’s also a mystery story so it is keeping me guessing!

I’m still reading ‘Pandora’s Jar’ by Natalie Haynes – I really like it but it has been pushed aside for various blog tour books. I’m currently reading about Helen of Troy and it is very interesting to hear a different perspective to usual as she is normally portrayed quite negatively.

I’ve started listening to the audiobook of ‘Let’s Do It’ by Jasper Rees, the biography of Victoria Wood. It’s engaging so far and interesting to hear about the more private side of Wood, the shy perfectionist, rather than her on-screen persona. The cast reading this are absolutely brilliant so I’m glad I went for the audio version.

What do you think you will read next?

I am about to read ‘The Cousins’ by Karen McManus for a blog tour with The Write Reads. I’m looking forward to this one as it is a standalone mystery about secrets within a family and sounds very tense!

I am also determined to get to the books that are top of my pile on Netgalley – ‘The Shape of Darkness’ by Laura Purcell and ‘Hyde’ by Craig Russell. I’m so looking forward to these two above all others. I’m determined to make a dent in the NetGalley backlog so that will be the focus of the next month or so.

So that’s another WWW Wednesday done! This year is flying by and I’m on the countdown to Christmas now…

Header photo with thanks to Alisa Anton for sharing her work on Unsplash.

October Wrap-Up and November TBR

How is it that time again?! The end of another month and another step nearer Christmas (yay!) and the end of 2020 (*huge sigh of relief*).

This month I have read 11 books and hit my GoodReads Challenge target of 100 books for the year!

It’s been a funny month with some real reading slumps as well as some absolutely BRILLIANT books. So, without further ado, here’s what I read this month…

(Links to books already published are affiliate links – thank you for supporting my blog with any purchases).

October Wrap-Up

I started the month with the brilliant ‘More Than a Woman’ by Caitlin Moran – an often funny, fresh and brutally honest take on what it means to be a middle-aged woman. This was my first five-star read of the month – you can see my review here.

After this, I read ‘Jeeves and the Leap of Faith’ by Ben Schott, a new Jeeves and Wooster novel written with the blessing of the PG Wodehouse estate. Nothing quite hits the highs of Wodehouse’s original novels, but Schott has done a great job of the language and comic elements. You can read my review here.

Next up was a blog tour for ‘The Creak on the Stairs’ by Eva Bjorg Aegisdottir, a chilling and dark piece of Nordic Noir crime fiction. Set in Iceland, this follows Chief Investigating Officer Elma as she tries to solve a murder that is stirring up the unsavoury past of some people in the small town of Akranes. You can read my blog tour post here.

Then came ‘The Servant’ by Maggie Richell-Davies, a dark historical tale of a girl who has fallen on difficult times in Georgian London. This book won the Historical Writers’ Association award for a (then) unpublished novel and is definitely worth a read – my review is here.

One of my audiobooks (listened to in the car with my kids) this month was Roald Dahl’s ‘Boy’, read by Dan Stevens. We all enjoyed this one – a lively performance of a book that I’ve loved since childhood. It has been a joy to relive the experiences of Dahl at school at Repton, on holiday in Norway, with his eccentric family and upsetting teachers and sweet-shop owners alike.

Next up was ‘The Phoenix Project’ by Michelle Kidd for another blog tour in November. This was a fast-paced thriller with a wide scope – London, Paris, Africa, Russian spies and the British Government – and all very tense! Watch this space for my blog tour review.

Then I enjoyed Walburga Appleseed’s ‘The Princess and the Prick’, a short book with some very concise feminist retellings of fairy tales, myths and nursery rhymes. Beautifully illustrated, this managed to pack plenty of food for thought into a small space.

Another short but powerful book was ‘Essex Girls’ by Sarah Perry, a feminist celebration of the qualities of the Essex Girl stereotype. In Perry’s book, Essex becomes a state of mind rather than a geographical location and we are introduced to a host of fabulous women from history. My review is here.

Another of my five-star books this month was ‘Practically Perfect: Life Lessons from Mary Poppins’ by Katy Brand. Anyone with any love for the 1964 film should read this as it is fascinating but delightfully comforting. My review can be found here.

Then I listened to another audiobook, ‘The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid’, a charming and funny book about Bill Bryson’s experiences of growing up in the 1950s in Des Moines in Iowa. This one is read by Bryson himself and his dry wit really comes through in the recording.

Finally, I finished the month with ‘The Devil and the Dark Water’ by Stuart Turton, a historical crime novel that I absolutely loved. You can read my review here.

November TBR

I am absolutely awful at predicting what I will read in the future – I read according to my mood and who knows where that may take me!?

However, I do have a lot of NetGalley ARCs that I should read. Here is just a selection:

  • ‘The Shape of Darkness’ by Laura Purcell – I loved her previous books and this one promises to be equally fabulous.
  • ‘The Whole Truth’ by Cara Hunter – this is the latest in a great series of police procedurals in which we follow DI Fawley as he tries to uncover truth. I’ve loved the other books so have high hopes for this.
  • ‘The Dead of Winter’ by Nicola Upson – another series I’ve followed for a long time, this one puts crime writer Josephine Tey into the role of detective against the backdrop of Europe in the lead-up to World War II.
  • ‘Hyde’ by Craig Russell – Russell’s first book, ‘The Devil Aspect’, was amazing and I hope this one will be every bit as good. Set in Victorian Edinburgh and featuring a series of mysterious ritualistic murders, this looks like it will be a dark and thrilling read.
  • ‘Mr Wilder and Me’ by Jonathan Coe – I’ve loved previous books by Coe and this, set in the heat of the 1977 summer, looks glorious.
  • ‘Nick’ by Michael Farris Smith – this new book about the early life of the fictional narrator of ‘The Great Gatsby’ looks really interesting.
  • ‘Lie Beside Me’ by Gytha Lodge – the latest in another crime series that I’ve enjoyed vey much. This is the latest to feature DCI Jonah Sheens.
  • ‘Let’s Do It: The Authorised Biography of Victoria Wood’ by Jasper Rees – I’ve been granted this one on audiobook and am looking forward to learning more about Wood from her closest friends and colleagues (some of whom narrate the book).

This is ignoring the huge stacks of books in my house and my jam-packed Kindle so we shall wait and see what I actually manage to read!

Header photo with thanks to Alex Geerts for sharing their work on Unsplash.