‘A Dark and Twisted Tide’ By Sharon Bolton

Published by Minotaur Books,
March 3, 2015.
ISBN:  978-1-250-06049-5 (PB)

Still reeling from her recent harrowing experiences, Lacey Flint chooses to cease being a detective and reverts to working in uniform, albeit on a boat patrolling the Thames River; also living in a boat in a small inlet and taking up swimming in the polluted waters.  But there is no way the author lets Lacey avoid danger and the taste of detecting.  So it comes to pass one day that she encounters the remains of a female while swimming.  And thus hangs a complicated tale.

Three more bodies turn up and Lacey becomes part of the investigation, which is full of twists and turns.  It appears that the victims were from Afghanistan and smuggled up the Thames to some hidden location near where Lacey’s boat is docked.  So the investigation initially is centered on a case involving people-smuggling.  The question, of course, is why.  A subplot involves Dana (Lacey’s boss) and her significant other, Helen, in their quest to have a baby, bringing them to a fertility clinic, setting the stage for another character to play a role in an ending that boggles the mind.

The author is famous for constructing novels full of surprises, and this one is no different.  It is full of red herrings keeping the reader off balance and turning pages to find out what happens next.  Recommended.

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Reviewer:  Ted Feit

Sharon Bolton (previously S. J. Bolton) is the critically acclaimed author of some of the most bone-chilling crime books ever written. She has been shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger for Crime Novel of the Year, the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and the CWA Dagger in the Library. 
Sharon lives near Oxford with her husband and young son.

www.sjbolton.com.

Ted and Gloria Feit live in Long Beach, NY, a few miles outside New York City.  For 26 years, Gloria was the manager of a medium-sized litigation firm in lower Manhattan. Her husband, Ted, is an attorney and former stock analyst, publicist and writer/editor for, over the years, several daily, weekly and monthly publications.  Having always been avid mystery readers, and since they're now retired, they're able to indulge that passion.  Their reviews appear online as well as in three print publications in the UK and US.  On a more personal note: both having been widowed, Gloria and Ted have five children and nine grandchildren between them.