‘Blood Sisters’ by Graham Masterton

Published by Head of Zeus,
8 October 2015.
ISBN: 978-1-78408-133-1

DS Katie Maguire has her hands full: an elderly nun mutilated and murdered, and twenty-three horses driven over a cliff. Then another nun is found dead ...

This was a real page-turner, with the third-person narrative moving quickly along between the story of the horses, the nun murders and Katie’s own domestic dilemma of whether to tell her newly-returned lover, John, that she’s carrying another man’s child. Katie was a sympathetic character, and the relationships and personalities within her Garda station were vividly sketched. I particularly enjoyed the Irish feel of the dialogue, the turns of phrase that brought the characters alive. The plotlines came together when the perp’s point of view was used, around the middle of the book, and we learned about motive. From then on, the tension was maintained in the duel between perp and police, with a final twist leading to a high-drama finish. The body count is high, and there are several truly nasty torture scenes. The final ending brings in characters from – I presume – an earlier case, and also throws in a cliff-hanger.

A well-told PP with a sympathetic central detective, and a real Irish feel. It’s the fifth in the Katie Maguire series, and though it read well as a stand-alone, it involves on-going storylines, so you might like to start with the first, White Bones.

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Reviewer: Marsali Taylor

Graham Masterton. was born in Edinburgh in 1946. His grandfather was Thomas Thorne Baker, the eminent scientist who invented DayGlo and was the first man to transmit news photographs by wireless. After training as a newspaper reporter, Graham went on to edit the new British menis magazine Mayfair, where he encouraged William Burroughs to develop a series of scientific and philosophical articles which eventually became Burroughsi novel The Wild Boys. At the age of 24, Graham was appointed executive editor of both Penthouse and Penthouse Forum magazines. At this time he started to write a bestselling series of sex 'how-to' books including How To Drive Your Man Wild In Bed which has sold over 3 million copies worldwide. His latest, Wild Sex For New Lovers is published by Penguin Putnam in January, 2001. He is a regular contributor to Cosmopolitan, Menis Health, Woman, Womanis Own and other mass-market self-improvement magazines. He lives in Surrey. His wife and agent Wiescka died on 27 April 2011, aged 65. He has just finished writing a black thriller featuring Irelandis only female detective superintendent, Katie Maguire, set in the Cork underworld; and a dark fantasy, Jessicais Angel, about a girlis search for five supposedly-dead children.

http://www.grahammasterton.co.uk/

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh, and came to Shetland as a newly-qualified teacher. She is currently a part-time teacher on Shetland's scenic west side, living with her husband and two Shetland ponies. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland's distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women's suffrage in Shetland. She's also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.  Marsali also does a regular monthly column for the Mystery People e-zine.