‘Deadly Will’ by Leigh Russell

Published by No Exit Press,
15 August 2024. 
ISBN: 978-1-83501-026-6 (PB)

This is the author's 22^nd novel in the Geraldine Steel series.  The novel follows Geraldine's return to work as a Senior Detective Inspector after her maternity leave.  She is both reluctant to leave her baby and relieved to get her old life back.  

There is a thrilling start to the story which details a murder, and the following pages explains something of the background to this murder and its subsequently linked second murder.  

Geraldine and her fellow detectives are focussed on the members of the family of Martin Reed, a rich man who has two grown up children and a young partner.  Martin is liked by practically all his acquaintances and family so it is quickly established that his murder must have been prompted by either greed or revenge.  Martin had recently changed his Will to benefit his young lover rather than his children who had expected to inherit his not inconsiderable fortune.  

The story has various side issues involving a criminal childminder (the stuff of nightmares for parents) and Geraldine's relationship with her partner who is also a detective who works undercover. 

This is a fascinating and sometimes chilling mystery which keeps you guessing right to the very end.  The characters are believable, and the story line is sufficiently action packed to keep the reader on their toes.  I really enjoyed it! 
------
Reviewer: Toni Russell

Leigh Russell studied at the University of Kent gaining a Master’s degree in English and American literature. Formerly a secondary school English teacher, with the success of her Geraldine Steel series, Leigh now writes full-time. Her debut novel, Cut Short, was published in 2009 by No Exit Press in the UK, there are now 22 books in the series  featuring detective Geraldine Steel.  Leigh also has a  series featuring Lucy Hall. Her most recent series features Poppy the dog. Leigh Russell is married with two daughters and lives in Middlesex.

 leighrussell.co.uk/

Toni Russell is a retired teacher who has lived in London all her life and loves the city.  She says, ‘I enjoy museums, galleries and the theatre but probably my favourite pastime is reading.  I found myself reading detective fiction almost for the first time during lockdown and have particularly enjoyed old fashioned detective fiction rather than the nordic noir variety.  I am a member of a book club at the local library and have previously attended literature classes at our local Adult Education Centre.  I am married with three children and five grandchildren. 

‘A Gravely Troubling Discovery’ by Hannah Hendy

Published by Canelo,
1 August 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-80436-472-7 (PB)

Accidental sleuths come in many forms; I’ve encountered musicians, sailors, archaeologists, vicars, who can’t seem to help tripping over bodies. But a team of school dinner ladies? That’s a new one on me. 

Hannah Hendy’s crew of Education Centre Nourishment Consultants, as they’re more pretentiously dubbed, have already tripped over four before this outing, and have even made it official with a website and fixed fee per case. This time around, the fifth in the series, they’ve vowed not to investigate any more murders – and then a body is found under the playground during a long overdue re-laying.

Even then, the ladies, led by Margery and Clementine Butcher-Baker, kitchen manager and head cook respectively, turn their attention to a different investigation: is Evelyn Redburn’s husband having an affair, and if so, who with? Could it be Vivian, Evelyn’s erstwhile best friend, local benefactor and owner of two of the biggest, most glamorous houses the dinner ladies have ever seen? The evidence points that way, but of course, in the best tradition of cosy crime fiction, things are never straightforward.

And then there’s the missing swimming gala trophy. And a second body, in the bottom of the swimming pool...

It all adds up to quite a tangled web for the ladies to unravel, especially when all the mysteries become muddled up together, but they managed to extricate the truth – and themselves – in the end, with the help of a friendly retired local copper Nigel and the hindrance and disapproval of his replacement Officer Wilkinson. Meanwhile, the schoolchildren get fed, the kitchen gets deep-cleaned, a wedding gets arranged and the school is subjected to an audit by an inspector who seems determined to find fault at every opportunity.

They’re a varied bunch of personalities. Margery is cautious and organized, and Clementine is more impulsive. Then there’s bride-to-be Seren, content to leave all the arrangements to bossy Rose, the deputy head. And heavily pregnant Ceri-Ann, and Karen and Sharon who dissolve into tears at the drop of a ladle.

On the whole, I think I’m glad I didn’t have kids who went to that school. Between bodies under the patio, sorry, playground, and a team of amateur detectives in the kitchen, it’s far too dangerous. Then again, they would have been well fed at lunchtimes, even if the dinner ladies did have to slope off to solve a murder once in a while. 
------
Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Hannah Hendy is a professional chef by day and author by night. She has recently signed a three book deal with Canelo publishing and is the author of the upcoming novel, ‘The Dinner Lady Detectives’. Hannah lives with her brand new wife (covid wedding!) and two cats in South Wales, UK.

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

Coming Soon: Journey to Casablanca by Judith Cranswick

 

The second book in the Murders At Sea series
Published by Liden Press
30 September 2024.

Magic, mayhem and murder behind the curtain

The Great Ernesto is brutally attacked while rehearsing for his next performance. Graham finds the dying man and becomes the prime suspect for his murder. Can Amanda cut through the intrigue, solve the enigma of the magician’s past and track down the culprit before her husband is arrested?  No one on the ship has a good word to say for Ernesto but who has sufficient motive to want him dead?

If you like cozy whodunits with a touch of edge set in beautiful locations with plenty of red herrings, then come with Amanda on a vicarious cruise. Experience not only a wonderful journey to exotic places, but also marvel at the misdirection and magic of the showbiz world of the old Variety Theatre.

Judith Cranswick was born and brought up in Norwich. Apart from writing, Judith’s great passions are travel and history. Both have influenced her two series of mystery novels. Tour Manager, Fiona Mason takes coach parties throughout Europe, and historian Aunt Jessica is the guest lecturer accompanying tour groups visiting more exotic destinations aided by her nephew Harry. Her published novels also include several award-winning standalone psychological thrillers. She wrote her first novel (now languishing in the back of a drawer somewhere) when her two children were toddlers, but there was little time for writing when she returned to her teaching career. Now retired, she is able to indulge her love of writing and has begun a life of crime! ‘Writers are told to write what they know about, but I can assure you, I've never committed a murder.  I'm an ex-convent school headmistress for goodness sake!’

http://judithcranswick.co.uk/  

‘The Vanishing Act’ by Sarah Ward

Published by Canelo,
4 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-80436-320-1 (PB)

Elsa is employed as a cleaner by the owners of several holiday homes and has to clean them every week, even when the holidaymakers are staying for a longer holiday. Tall Pines is her least favourite house to work at because it is situated deep in the forest and because it has a frightening history. The current visitors are booked to stay for three weeks, which is strange for a house set in such an isolated location. Last week the visitors arrived early while Elsa was still working in the house, but Elsa obeyed her employers’ instructions and did not open the door until she had finished her work and then slipped away without speaking to them. However, she did watch the new arrivals from the window and saw a middle-aged man, a teenaged boy and girl and a younger, red-haired girl; a woman stayed in the car and Elsa saw very little of her face because she was wearing large dark glasses.

The next week when Elsa arrives, she is certain something strange is going on. The house is unlocked but the holidaymakers’ car has gone. Inside there is no sign of the occupants, however a kettle is still boiling on the Aga, bread only half buttered and other food for a picnic is on the kitchen table ready to be used, also a chair has been over-turned as if somebody had jumped up in a hurry. Elsa is worried about the family’s absence and asks advice from Mallory Dawson, a police detective who took early retirement and is spending the summer in a caravan on the Welsh coast with her teenage son. Mallory met Elsa during an earlier murder investigation and respects the girl’s good sense and instincts, so she goes out to Tall Pines and looks around. The family have not returned, and Mallory has to admit that the situation appears unusual, but she does not think it justifies contacting the police.

Tall Pines has been renamed by its current owners. Previously it had been called Pant Meinog, which means stony valley, and under this earlier name it has a sinister history. In 2003 the house had been occupied by a remote relation of the owner, Tom Thomas, who also lives in the only house near to Pant Meinog. This family consisted of a husband and wife, who were selfishly engrossed in their own hippie lifestyle and were rarely there for their three children, two teenage girls and a younger boy. That summer the two girls were bored and amused themselves by inventing a poltergeist. They used the art of distraction to throw things around and pretended it happened by supernatural means. Police and an exorcist were involved and the older girl tired of the game, however soon after this the younger girl, Gwenllian, emerged from her room screaming, with blood pouring from deep wounds, which resembled claw marks, on her face. Despite her sister’s admission that the earlier poltergeist activity was a hoax, Gwenllian insisted that she was attacked by a supernatural creature. Soon afterwards the family moved away.

After checking out the house, Mallory decides to hang around in town and go back to the house in the evening to see if the family has returned. To kill time she contacts a friend, Harri Evans a detective Inspector with the local police. Mallory tells Harri about the missing family. While Harri says that there is too little evidence to report it officially to the police he is more concerned than he admits because when he was a young police officer he had attended two of the poltergeist incidents, including the final one when Gwenllian was injured, and this affected him deeply.

The family do not return but soon everything changes radically when a body is discovered in a local lay-by. The car matches the description of the vehicle that Elsa saw outside the house but there is no identity to be found on the corpse and the police discover that both car and house were rented using cash and stolen ID. The police have to discover the identity of the dead person and the reason why the family were on holiday under a false identity, but it is even more urgent to find the missing people, especially the children. Mallory is employed as a civilian investigator on the police team, and it soon becomes clear that the tragedy of the present is embedded in the past. Mallory probes deeper into the history of Pant Meinog, and tries to make sense of the relationships of the people involved, both in the past and present. As she does so the death count mounts, and her own life is in unforeseen danger.

The Vanishing Act is the third book in the series featuring Mallory Dawson. It is a fascinating mixture of the past and present and a subtle study of a psychopathic personality, as well as the destructive force that certain places may have upon those vulnerable to atmosphere. It has a cleverly constructed plot and engaging protagonists. The Vanishing Act is an excellent read, which I recommend.
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Reviewer: Carol Westron

Sarah Ward is the author of four DC Childs novels set in the Derbyshire Peak District where she lives. She is also writes gothic historical thrillers as Rhiannon Ward. The Birthday Girl, is the first book in her new Welsh based series, published 6th April 2023. She has also written Doctor Who audio dramas. Sarah is on Board of the Crime Writers Association and Friends of Buxton Festival, is a member of Crime Cymru, and a Royal Literary Fund fellow at Sheffield University.  

www.crimepieces.com 

Carol Westron is a successful author and a Creative Writing teacher.  Her crime novels are set both in contemporary and Victorian times. Her first book The Terminal Velocity of Cats was published in 2013. Since then, she has since written 8 further mysteries. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. interview

www.carolwestron.com
To read a review of Carol latest book click on the title
Death and the Dancing  

‘The Last Time I Saw Him’ by Rachel Abbott

Published by Wildfire,
15 August 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-03540341-7  (PB)

During a well-earned weekend away with her mum, Stephanie King encounters Ellis Cobain, a wealthy entrepreneur, on holiday at the same hotel with his wife Celia. But Celia hardly puts in an appearance, and Cobain has dinner with another woman and her husband. To Stephanie’s sharp eyes, it’s plain that he and the woman know each other, and the woman wishes they didn’t.

A few days later, Steph finds herself back at the same hotel, but this time in her official capacity of detective sergeant. Her partner DCI Gus Brodie co-opts her into the murder investigation team when Ellis Cobain’s body is found on his luxury yacht, moored at sea just a few hundred yards from the hotel. Cobain’s wife is still there, and so are the couple Steph saw him with at the weekend, Juliette and Russell Dalton. Russell is a lawyer for a talent agency, and is there to discuss a contract with Nadia Shariq, a jazz singer who has a residency at the hotel.

No case is ever straightforward for Steph, Gus and the team, but this one proves even more complicated than most. What little evidence they find points towards one of the three women, nervy Celia, uptight Juliette and self-assured but vulnerable Nadia; each of them has history with Cobain and good reason to want him dead. But everything they do find is circumstantial, and there’s nothing to point definitively to one of the three. In addition, Ellis Cobain emerges as a thoroughly dislikeable character, which leads to a certain reluctance to pin his murder on anyone.

Rachel Abbott’s novels are always far more about the characters than the crime. The personalities of Celia, Juliette and Nadia, and of the people around them, are full and rich, and their lives could continue way beyond the story they inhabit. Steph and Gus, too, have a past and ongoing relationship which transcends this novel and the series it belongs in. Even the minor characters seem to exist both in- and outside the narrative.

The locations, too, spring off the page: the subtle, stylish hotel suites; the unspoiled and sometimes treacherous Cornish clifftop and coves; Cobain’s ostentatious luxury yacht.

It’s a novel in which the reader is always allowed to be a few steps ahead of the police, and it’s all the better for it; we’re kept wondering how it will be resolved, and how justice can best be served. There’s a shocking twist close to the end, and I was left aching to know what Rachel Abbott’s plans are for her protagonists. This is crime writing at its absolute best.
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Rachel Abbott was born just outside Manchester, England.   She became a systems analyst at the age of 21 in the early 1970s and formed her own software company in the mid-1980s designing computer programmes for education.   The company expanded into all forms of interactive media and became extremely successful. The sale of the company in 2000 enabled her to take early retirement and fulfil one of her lifelong ambitions - to buy and restore a property in Italy.  Once there she completely restored a ruined monastery and started a second successful business renting it out for weddings and conferences. In 2010 she embarked on her third career and wrote her first book Only the Innocent. She has now written fourteen books.

 www.rachel-abbott.com/ 

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

‘The Quiet Woman’ by Priscilla Masters

Published by Severn House,
2 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-4483-1309-9 (HB)

Nurse Florence Shaw is part of a busy practice at her local doctors’ surgery, dealing with cases that do not require a doctor or, if she thinks it is necessary, sending them on for a doctor’s consultation. There are two regular patients who both worry Florence, although for very different reasons. Ryan Wood is a young man who claims to be trying to give up smoking, although Florence has doubts about his determination to do so. Ryan has had a disrupted childhood and has often had to act as carer for his alcoholic mother and Florence suspects he is on the fringes of criminality; nevertheless, she has a soft spot for him. The other recurring patient is one that Florence is really concerned about: Christine Clay is a woman in her sixties, who is continually making appointments to complain of a number of vague and unrelated symptoms, such as headaches, indigestion and insomnia. Florence has requested the doctor to send Christine for a large number of tests, all of which have confirmed that Christine is not suffering from any serious underlying condition. The thing that most worries and annoys Florence is that Christine never attends an appointment by herself. She is always accompanied by her husband, Richard, a severe man who insists on answering all the questions Florence asks his wife and often appears impatient, even despising, of his wife’s symptoms. Florence is convinced that Richard Clay is dominating his downtrodden, submissive wife. She requests Christine’s doctor to put her on the waiting list for psychological assessment and treatment but one day Christine arrives at the surgery alone and seems different in her manner than she usually does. Soon after this strange departure from their normal routine, Christine and Richard are found in their home suffering from a drug overdose. Richard is unconscious and is transported to hospital and survives but Christine dies.

The official verdict is that Christine believed she had cancer and decided to kill herself rather than die in agony and Richard elected to die with her. However, Florence cannot believe that the couple had really agreed upon a suicide pact. Nothing that she observed in their relationship makes her able to accept that Richard would kill himself rather than live without Christine. She is also worried about her own position, especially when she discovers that the couple’s daughter is an investigative journalist who specialises in highlighting failures in the NHS. She turns up, ostensibly to care for her father, but she makes it clear that she is going to probe into the reason why her mother did not receive appropriate treatment for her fixation that she had cancer. Florence knows that neither Christine nor Richard had ever mentioned concerns about cancer, but she also is aware that nurses are an easy target for accusations of causing harm by carelessness.

Florence’s personal life is also growing more complicated than it has been for some time. Her ex-husband, Mark, a detective sergeant, had left her for a much younger woman but now he is about to become a father again and shows signs of regretting his folly in leaving Florence. However, she has no desire to accept him back. In fact, Florence is starting a relationship with another detective, DC William Summers, and despite feeling some nervousness at starting the dating game for the first time in many years, she is happy.

Florence is determined to probe into Christine’s death as well as trying to discover what trouble Ryan is getting up to with his newly acquired criminal associates. However, the more Florence discovers about Christine Clay the more it becomes apparent that there are many secrets behind the meek facade that this quiet woman presented to the world.

The Quiet Woman is the second book in the series featuring Florence Shaw. It is a fascinating novel with an interesting plot and a delightful and thoroughly engaging protagonist. This an excellent read which I recommend.
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Reviewer: Carol Westron

Priscilla Masters was born in Halifax, and brought up in South Wales, one of seven multi-racial children adopted by an orthopaedic surgeon and his Classics graduate wife. Priscilla trained as a registered nurse in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham. She moved to Staffordshire in the 1970s, had an antiques business for a while and two sons. She started writing in the 1980s in response to an aunt asking her what she was going to do with her life! Winding up the Serpent was her first Joanna Piercy story, published in 1995.  Although that series is still continuing the latest Crooked Street published 2016, she has also written several medical standalones and a new series featuring coroner Martha Gunn, set in Shrewsbury. Her latest book is An Imperfect Truth, a psychological thriller featuring Dr Claire Roget who is a forensic psychiatrist who has some very unpredictable patients. It is set in Stoke on Trent.

http://www.priscillamasters.co.uk/ 

Carol Westron is a successful author and a Creative Writing teacher.  Her crime novels are set both in contemporary and Victorian times.  Her first book The Terminal Velocity of Cats was published in 2013. Since then, she has since written 8 further mysteries. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. interview

www.carolwestron.com
To read a review of Carol latest book click on the title
Death and the Dancing Snowman

‘What She Did’ by Karen Cole

Published by Quercus,
18 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-5294-1-599-5 (PB)

A single mother with two teenage children, a demanding job and a waste of space for an ex-husband gets a late-night phone call from her distraught son. She goes to his rescue and finds him panicking over the dead body of his former girlfriend. He swears he found her like that and was in no way to blame. She’s forced to weigh up the potential outcome of calling the police – and instead she agrees to help him hide the body. As long as they both say nothing and hold their nerve, they can get away with it.

This all happens in the first thirty pages of this tense, fast-paced psychological thriller. The remaining 300-plus pages are the consequences. Because there are always consequences.  

An additional complication is that the family, Mother Emma, son Jack and daughter Molly, are ex-pats living in Cyprus. Emma’s ex is Greek Cypriot, and also lives on the island with his glamorous and slightly irresponsible new partner. Emma is a teacher of English at a private school, and as if things weren’t tortuous enough already, she’s having an affair with the dead girl’s father, also a teacher at the school. 

Emma and Jack agree that the best way forward is to find out who really did kill Zoe, the dead girl, but Jack isn’t much use in that regard. And as she desperately tried to balance everyday life, a demanding boss and doing everything she can to protect her son, complication piles on top of complication, and Emma’s life slowly falls apart.

The narrative relies heavily on the characters, their qualities and reactions and the interplay between them, to drive it forward; fortunately, this is Karen Cole’s great strength. Jack and Molly are self-absorbed in a normal, teenage way. Of the young people Emma teaches, some are directly involved, others hover in the background; all are distinct characters, different from each other. Her lover Ethan is all at sea, made so by his daughter’s apparent disappearance, and clings to any available life-raft including Emma herself. Her boss Helen tries to appear supportive and helpful but there’s a snide undertone which reveals her true agenda.

The big question, of course, is what really did happen to Zoe – and when the answer comes it’s a shock and a surprise, but the clues were there all along.

Karen Cole is clearly a force to be reckoned with in the crime fiction world. She writes about ordinary, real-sounding people in extraordinary circumstances, and their confusions and reactions come to vivid life. This is her sixth novel and can only garner new fans for her. 
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Karen Cole grew up in the Cotswolds and got a degree in psychology at Newcastle University. She spent several years teaching English around the world before settling in Cyprus with her husband and two sons, where she works at a British army base as a primary school teacher. She completed the Curtis Brown writing course where she found her love of writing psychological thrillers.

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

 

Coming Soon: Poppy's Christmas Cracker by Leigh Russell

The 4th book in the Poppy Mystery Series

Published by Crime & Mystery, 19 September 2024
Available in Paperback & Kindle

A French patisserie opens in the village of Ashton Mead in time for Christmas. Local residents are pleased but Hannah, owner of the Sunshine Tea Shoppe, feels threatened by the competition.

When the owner of the patisserie is killed, Hannah is suspected of murdering her business rival. Her friend, Emily, is determined to clear Hannah's name. She seems to be facing an impossible task... until her little dog Poppy makes a surprising discovery.

Leigh Russell has written twenty one books in her Geraldine Steel series. Leigh launched a new cosy series in March 2023 with Barking up the Right Tree. This was followed by Barking Mad in July 2023. Her latest in the series is, Poppy Takes the Lead, published 30 January 2024. Leigh has twice been a Finalist for The People's Book Prize. She is Chair of the CWA Debut Dagger judges, and a Royal Literary Fellow.

http://leighrussell.co.uk   

‘Knock Knock’ by Michelle Teahan

Published by Headline,
13 June 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-03-545061-9 (PB)

Marcus and Gina are thrilled to bits when a large pharmaceutical firm Gina works for covers the cost of a house for them on the Cowerworth Estate in a Cork suburb. It’s a perfect place of detached houses and all neat lawns.

Marcus makes an instant impression on all the women, he is devastatingly handsome, but he has hidden tendencies unknown to anyone.

Next door to the new arrivals live Sarah, her husband Kevin and their young son Dillon. Across the road are Maisie and her husband Peter.

As soon as Marcus sees Sarah, he is smitten, he compares her to a cigarette – he has a craving for her. She finds herself attracted to him in return. Marcus enjoys seducing women and then when they fear being found out, he completely ignores them, it drives them crazy. It turns him on seeing them suffer. He does actually suspect Sarah may be different though and it really thrills him. However, he does not realise just how different.

Maisie over the road fancies Marcus like mad, but then she flirts with all the men, especially Sarah’s husband.

Then there is a sudden death, supposedly from a drugs overdose, but was it really accidental? The neighbours have never had so much to gossip about and under the guise of shock and horror, most of them are thrilled to bits!

It all settles down after a couple of weeks and Marcus now decides he wants the extra thrill of killing Sarah and plans it meticulously. However, oh boy, how he has underestimated her! 

Throughout the book we learn of sessions between a “Host” and a “Guest”, the “Guest” talking about Marcus and at one of the later sessions mentions that Marcus has started ignoring her and how distraught she is. It is not until the end of the book we discover who she is and it’s a real revelation.

On the last pages there is another unexpected death – this time it is obviously murder and all is revealed to the reader very satisfactorily making for a wholly unexpected ending.

A thoroughly enjoyable story that builds up with a great sense of anticipation and goodness how worth the wait it is. A tale of an extreme act of revenge. Most highly recommended.
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Reviewer: Tricia Chappell

Michelle Teahan is a qualified Medical Scientist but her passion has always been writing stories. She loves creating strong female characters, putting them in the worst types of situations and seeing how they react. She lives in County Cork, Ireland with her husband, two young daughters and a giant ginger cat. 

Tricia Chappell. I have a great love of books and reading, especially crime and thrillers. I play the occasional game of golf (when I am not reading). My great love is cruising especially to far flung places, when there are long days at sea for plenty more reading! I am really enjoying reviewing books and have found lots of great new authors.

‘Two Sisters’ by Alex Kane

Published by Canelo Hera,
21 March 2024.
ISBN 978-1-80436041-5 (PB)

Set-in present-day Glasgow, Two Sisters is the story of three generations of women.  Janey Hallahan is mother to twins Orla and Sinead, the sisters of the title, and grandmother to Orla’s daughter Molly Rose.  The relationship, however, is fractured; Janey abandoned her daughters whilst they were still babies.  Initially the youngsters were adopted by a loving couple but from the age of ten they suffered another misfortune and found themselves being shuttled between foster homes.  Now thirty eight years old, the sisters’ lives could hardly be more different. Orla lives with loving husband Oliver and their only child Molly Rose.  Sinead, by contrast, endures a sordid existence defined by her addiction to drink and drugs.  Orla is frustrated by her twin’s chaotic and disreputable lifestyle, although sisterly love means that she frequently bails Sinead out of difficulties.  The sensible twin also faces challenges from Molly Rose who is pushing the boundaries as she sprints towards her sixteenth year.  To make matters worse, Janey has reached out to reconnect with Orla who, unsurprisingly, eschews any reacquaintance with a mother she regards as having thrown her two children to the dogs.  Sinead is unaware of this, and Orla wants to keep it that way, little knowing that her estranged mother won’t take no for an answer.  Life is about to become even more complicated and very, very dangerous.

The characters in the novel are a fascinating mix of vulnerable and vicious.  Janey heads up what had been her father’s criminal empire.  She is as tough as you might imagine and never shies away from making difficult decisions.  When she realises her offspring are being targeted to bring her down, Janey is at her most ferocious. 

As the narrative unfolds, we see glimpses of maternal love from the hard-hitting matriarch but will the daughters she deserted ever be able to accept their birth mother. The strong female characters in the novel are a driving force as the plot develops and they prove to be more than a match for their male counterparts who operate in Glasgow’s chilling gangland. 

The prologue illustrates this felonious netherworld perfectly as it describes a terrifying chase that culminates in a child being abducted.  The narrative then moves back in time to depict the events that led up to the young girl being snatched.  It then moves between the troubled mid-1980s, during which an intriguing backstory unfolds, and the present day through a series of time shifts that disorientate the reader as they experience the impact of a disordered world of criminality that is, thankfully, alien to most of us.

Two Sisters is the second book in the “Janey” series, it works very well as a standalone.  Gritty, sometimes uncomfortable and often shocking, this is a rollercoaster of a novel that compels and entertains. Highly recommended.
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 Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent 

Alex Kane, aka Emma L Clapperton, was born December 1985, and has always had a passion for reading and writing. She studied childcare and gained qualifications to work with the early years in 2002. She completed her first novel, Beyond Evidence and it was published in September 2012 with a second edition being published in April 2013. She currently resides in a little town outside of the city of Glasgow with her partner and is working on her next project.

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

Coming Soon: Hemlock Bay by Martin Edwards

The 5th book in the

Rachel Savernake series.

Published by Head of Zeus, 
12 September 2024 

The first rule of murder: know your victim.
Basil Palmer has decided to murder a man called Louis Carson. There's only one problem: he doesn't know anything about his intended victim, not who he is or where he lives.
Basil learns that Carson owns Hemlock Bay, a resort for the wealthy and privileged. Knowing that his plan will only work if he covers his tracks, he invents a false identity and, posing as Dr Seamus Doyle, journeys to the coast plotting murder along the way.
Meanwhile Rachel Savernake buys an intriguing painting of a place called Hemlock Bay, one that she cannot get out of her head. Macabre and strange, the image shows a shape that seems to represent a dead body lying on the beach.
Convinced that there is something sinister lurking amongst the glamour of the bay, Rachel books a cottage there - where she meets a mysterious doctor called Seamus Doyle. 10

Martin Edwards is the author of 21 novels, including the Lake District Mysteries and the Rachel Savernake books, and also an acclaimed history of crime fiction, The Life of Crime. He received the CWA Diamond Dagger for the sustained excellence of his work. He has also won the Edgar, Agatha, CrimeFest H.R.F. Keating and Macavity awards, the Short Story Dagger and Dagger in the Library, plus the Poirot award for his contribution to the genre.  

 https://martinedwardsbooks.com

‘Road To Harm’ by Judith Cutler

Published by Joffe Books,
9 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-83526696-0 (PB)
Originally Published 1 April 2015 as
Green and Pleasant Land.

This is the sixth book in Judith Cutlers’ Fran Harman series. Recently retired as a chief superintendent and married to her old boss ACC Mark Turner, the two return from their honeymoon and are invited to lead a team investigating a cold case involving the disappearance of a glamourous footballer’s wife and her four-year-old son. Twenty years ago, Natalie Forman’s abandoned car containing the body of her baby son still strapped in his car seat was found by a passerby. The initial investigation was seriously hampered by extreme weather conditions which blanketed the whole area in snow for several weeks. It was assumed that Natalie must have headed off into the forest with her oldest son and became lost, but their bodies were never found.

From the moment they arrive, Fran and Mark are made aware that they are not welcome. The officer who requested their participation has been forced into retirement and no one from the police, the family or the public seems to want to assist the pair in their investigation and at times are openly hostile. The more determined the locals appear to want to keep the past buried, the more resolute Fran and Mark become in their search of the truth of what really happened on that fateful night.

The unusual, intriguing plot that continually twists and turns piling on problem after problem keeps the reader guessing until the final pages. The characters are well-drawn, and the reader is never sure if the loyalty of even the small team assigned to help with Fran and Mark’s investigation can be relied upon.

An excellent read which I can wholeheartedly recommend.

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Reviewer: Judith Cranswick  

Judith Cutler was born in the Black Country, just outside Birmingham, later moving to the Birmingham suburb of Harborne. Judith started writing while she was at the then Oldbury Grammar School, winning the Critical Quarterly Short Story prize with the second story she wrote. She subsequently read English at university. It was an attack of chickenpox caught from her son that kick-started her writing career. One way of dealing with the itch was to hold a pencil in one hand, a block of paper in the other - and so she wrote her first novel. This eventually appeared in a much-revised version as Coming Alive, published by Severn House. Judith has eight series. The first two featured amateur sleuth Sophie Rivers (10 books) and Detective Sergeant Kate Power (6 Books). Then came Josie Wells, a middle-aged woman with a quick tongue, and a love of good food, there are two books, The Food Detective and The Chinese Takeout. The Lina Townsend books are set in the world of antiques and there are seven books in this series. There are three books featuring Tobias Campion set in the Regency period, and her series featuring Chief Superintendent Fran Harman (6 books), and Jodie Welsh, Rector’s wife and amateur sleuth. Her more recently a series feature a head teacher Jane Cowan (3 books). Judith has also written three standalone’s Staging Death, Scar Tissue, and Death In Elysium. Her new series is set in Victorian times featuring Matthew Rowsley. Death’s Long Shadow is the third book in this series. 

 http://www.judithcutler.com

Judith Cranswick was born and brought up in Norwich. Apart from writing, Judith’s great passions are travel and history. Both have influenced her two series of mystery novels. Tour Manager, Fiona Mason takes coach parties throughout Europe, and historian Aunt Jessica is the guest lecturer accompanying tour groups visiting more exotic destinations aided by her nephew Harry. Her published novels also include several award-winning standalone psychological thrillers. She wrote her first novel (now languishing in the back of a drawer somewhere) when her two children were toddlers, but there was little time for writing when she returned to her teaching career. Now retired, she is able to indulge her love of writing and has begun a life of crime! ‘Writers are told to write what they know about, but I can assure you, I've never committed a murder. I'm an ex-convent school headmistress for goodness sake!’ Her most recent book is Passage to Greenland

http://judithcranswick.co.uk/