Heart of Betrayal by Andrew Britton

Published by Penguin.
1st February 2007.
ISBN 978-0-141-02796-8 (PB)

Former Special Forces Officer Ryan Kealey is now living in Maine, lecturing occasionally at the University of Maine as an associated professor of International relations. His partner of six months is Katie Donavon, who isn’t totally sure he has retired.

When Ryan sees on the news a terrorist strike on Independence Avenue, Washington DC – a hit on three cars in broad daylight, killing a US Senator, an outspoken critic of Iranian hard-liners, he waits for the telephone call he knows will come.

Arriving in Langley Virginia, Jonathan Harper Deputy Operation Director at Langley shows Ryan a tape on which he identifies Jason March, an American national, now clearly high up in Al-Qaeda. Ryan Kealey knows Jason March, not a man to make mistakes. So, who can stop him, only one of their own, the man who trained him Former Special Forces Officer Ryan Thomas Kealey. The hunt is on.

Within two weeks Washington DC is again the scene of terrorist devastation. Both Ryan and his new partner British Naomi Kharmai of Central Intelligence, Counter Terrorism, are caught in the operation.

Like all good stories much of the intrigue lies buried in the past. Just what did Jason March do to Ryan, and where exactly is he? Written from multiple points of view with the action switching constantly from Washington to Langley to Iran, and then to South Africa, with a couple of end of chapter cliff-hangers, this is a page turner. The characterisation is excellent - I chuckled at the reference to Naomi scratching her butt. Also, some great sexual tension. A stunning unexpected climax. Recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Andrew Britton was born in Peterborough, England, in 1981. He spent his formative years in England and Camlough, Northern Ireland, a small village which is home to most of the family on his mother's side. In 1988, his family immigrated to the United States, taking up residence in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Just before his junior year of high school, Britton moved to Raleigh, North Carolina. Andrew Britton passed away in March 2008, from a heart condition that was previously undiagnosed.

‘A Murder Inside’ by Frances Brody

Published by Little Brown,
28 October 2021.
ISBN: 978-0-349-42310-4 (PB)

Nell Lewis has been working in the Prison Service for eighteen years because she believed that it would give her a better chance of promotion than her original choice of the Police Force. This career choice has been justified and, in 1969, she faces her greatest opportunity, and her greatest challenge, when she is appointed Deputy Governor at the newly established Brackerley Open Prison for Women. Nell knows this is not going to be an easy task: Brackerley has been a borstal for boys, and it will be difficult to redecorate the facilities to make them suitable for the new residents, especially with little time and on a limited budget. Even more worrying is the fact that the borstal has just been involved in a corruption scandal, which resulted in a prison officer being sent to prison. The male officer who had reported the corruption is still at Brackerley when Nell arrives, although he is due to be transferred to a male prison, as are most of the male prison staff who had worked at the boys’ borstal. Nell also has the problem of dealing tactfully with the current Governor, Governor Harding, an elderly ex-army officer, who is regarded with affection and respect by all of the remaining Brackerley prison officers. Harding is due to retire in the near future, but Nell is concerned about his ill health and alcoholism and she fears that he has been turning a blind eye to misdemeanours by some of his corrupt officers. Despite all these complications, Nell is determined to turn Brackerley into a positive place where women learn to rebuild their lives so that they can re-enter the outside world with the skills to earn their own living.

There are two viewpoint characters: the central one is Nell Lewis, and the other is Linda Rogers. Linda is a young university student who was convicted of murdering a middle-aged man, the father of another student, who had apparently wandered by error into her room. Linda pleaded guilty, which meant that the truth about the death had never been fully explored. Linda has become quite institutionalised and is afraid of this new move to greater autonomy but, as she settles in with the three other women who are the first residents of the open prison, she begins to regain confidence and face the truth about what had happened to her in the past.

Despite her concerns, Nell is pleased with the initial progress as she attempts to turn the female prison staff into a cohesive and enthusiastic team who are dedicated to making Brackerley a positive place for the residents. Just as she thinks all is beginning to go well, she discovers a body in the prison grounds, and it is evident that he did not die a natural death. While the police are still investigating, a fresh crisis occurs when one of the new residents goes missing. Nell is sure she knows where the young woman is headed and she is determined to recover her before she wrecks her chances of a more positive future, however, returning her absconding prisoner to Brackerley proves far more hazardous than Nell anticipates.

A Murder Inside is the first in a new series featuring Nell Lewis. The historical detail is superb, recalling a time that has much in common with the present day but also many differences in attitude, lifestyle and technology. The details about the prison service, the setting up of the new open prison and the relationships between the prison officers are fascinating and totally convincing. The plot is well-paced and cleverly constructed. Nell is an engaging protagonist, strong but compassionate and with an overwhelming sense of justice; and Linda is vulnerable, sensitive and damaged, but with an inner core of resilience. A Murder Inside is the start of an exciting new series. It is a page-turner that I thoroughly recommend.
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Reviewer: Carol Westron

Frances Brody is a pseudonym of Frances McNeil who lives in Leeds where she was born and grew up. She worked in the USA as a secretary in Washington DC and New York. Frances studied at Ruskin College, Oxford and read English Literature and History at York University. Starting her writing life in radio, she has written scripts for television and theatre. Frances turned to crime for her first novel, Dying in the Wool, set on the outskirts of Bradford, Yorkshire in the 1920s.  Eight further books have followed featuring Kate Shackleton.

 http://www.francesbrody.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 5 further mysteries. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. To read the interview click on the link below. 

https://promotingcrime.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/carol-westron.html www.carolwestron.com
http://carolwestron.blogspot.co.uk/
To read a review of Carol latest book This Game of Ghosts
click on the title.

‘The Killer Next Door’ by Alex Marwood

Published by Sphere,
19 June 2014.
ISBN: 978-0-75155069-6 (PB)

After reading this brilliant thriller, I can only offer up thanks that I no longer have to consider the option of living in a London bed-sit! 

 

23 Beulah Grove is home to an assorted company of the lost, all looking to escape from some threat, or hoping for their luck to change.  Though they don't realize it, they are all manipulated by the sinister and repellant Landlord.  Among their number dwells The Lover, a loner wanting only to be loved, and solving his problem in the most gruesome of ways, graphically laid out for the reader to absorb – and wince at.  Add a steamingly hot summer in London, terrible trouble with the drains, rats and break-ins and a ruthlessly sadistic gangster, and you have all the ingredients for a truly horrific story.  Over the top?  Perhaps a little, here and there, but that simply increases the thrill. 

 

Marwood's ability to create flawed but sympathetic characters is what made this book resonate for me.  I thought her first book, The Wicked Girls, was excellent: The Killer Next Door is even better.
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Reviewer: Susan Moody

Alex Marwood is the pseudonym of a successful journalist who has worked extensively across the British press. Alex lives in South London and is working on her next novel.

Susan Moody was born in Oxford is the principal nom de plume of Susan Elizabeth Donaldson, née Horwood, a British novelist best known for her suspense novels. Susan Moody began writing crime novels with Penny Black, the first of the seven Penny Wanawake crime novels.  She has a second series of six books featuring bridge player Cassie Swan. In all, she has published 29 novels, most of them crime and suspense. Susan spent two years as a Creative Writing Tutor in Her Majesty's Prison, Bedford. She is a past Chairman of the Crime Writers' Association, serving in all as a CWA Committee member for seven years. She is a long-standing member of the prestigious Detection Club and served for three years as the President of the International Association of Crime Writers.  In 2016 Susan Moody began a new series featuring Alex Quick. Click the title to read a review of Quick and the Dead

 http://susanmoody.co.uk

‘Strangers’ by Carla Banks

Published by Harper,
4 July 2011.
ISBN 978-0-00-719213-7 (PB)

Roisin meets Joe Massey when she is out jogging one morning in April. Joe is a pathologist just recently returned from Saudi Arabia. They spend an idyllic summer together, then in September Joe receives an offer of a job from Riyadh and asks Roisin to go with him as his wife.

For Roisin life in Riyadh is new and fascinating, and there is much to learn. She meets Damien O’Neill who has been in the Kingdom for many years. Having two weeks holiday before she starts her job at the University she explores the city and is confident that she and Joe will be happy here. But as they settle into their working routine she is soon aware that Joe has secrets, and that they maybe connected to a student Haroun Patel who was executed in the Kingdom in April of that year, just weeks before she met Joe.

The story is told from two points of view that of Roisin and of Damien O’Neill., and it is Joe that held my interest. Throughout the story he remains an enigmatic and interesting character and I wanted to hold him back from the path on which he was so clearly set.

The book paints a claustrophobic picture of life for women in Riyadh, controlling and stifling the expression of ideas not approved by the Kingdom. As ever in this style of government there are the informers, the people whom one believes are colleagues and in some cases friends but have a different alliance. Not a comfortable atmosphere in which to work as Roisin discovers, even though she is enjoying the actual teaching. She makes friends with two of her students. But as time passes Roisin realises that there are many underlying fractions, and soon she is unwittingly caught up in an intrigue.

A truly fascinating book, I couldn’t put it down and highly recommend it.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Carla Banks is a pseudonym of Danuta Reah, who has written several books under her own name. Carla grew up in a scholarly family. Her father, an Eastern European cavalry officer, came to the UK as a wartime refugee where he met and married her half-Irish mother. He told his children stories of his childhood in a country that had been destroyed by the war. Carla Banks has been an academic for most of her working life and is fascinated by the power of language. She lives in the north of England and now writes full time.

 danutakot@gmail.com 

‘The Last 10 Seconds’ by Simon Kernick

Published by Bantam Press,
21^st January 2010.
ISBN: 978-0-59306286-9

DCI Tina Boyd is chasing down a brutal violent killer, dubbed ‘The Night Creeper, who tortures young women to death.

Sean Egan who found the life in the police force too tame has for the last ten years worked undercover.  He has finally managed to infiltrate one of London’s most dangerous criminal gangs, but the mission is unauthorised, and Sean has his own agenda.

The action covers a thirty-seven-hour period, and during that time The Night Creeper is captured, and Sean Egan crosses the line.

When Sean discovers that his recruitment to the gang is to abduct The Night Creeper from police custody, he wants to know who wants it done and why?  And so, the lives of Tina Boyd and Sean Egan collide.

The action is unrelenting, and exciting. As the action unfolds we learn the background to Sean’s obsession with this particular gang, and to Tina’s problems.  But they are dealing with dangerous people and soon it is clear that someone wants The Night Creeper dead and if they get in the way, they are expendable.

This is a real page-turner. Recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Simon Kernick is one of Britain's most exciting new thriller writers. He arrived on the crime writing scene with his highly acclaimed debut novel The Business of Dying, the story of a corrupt cop moonlighting as a hitman. However, Simon's big breakthrough came with his novel Relentless which was selected by Richard and Judy for their Recommended Summer Reads promotion, and then rapidly went on to become the bestselling thriller of 2007. Simon's research is what makes his thrillers so authentic. He talks both on and off the record to members of Special Branch, the Anti-Terrorist Branch and the Serious and Organised Crime Agency, so he gets to hear first hand what actually happens in the dark and murky underbelly of UK crime. To find out more about Simon Kernick and his thrillers, please. 

www.simonkernick.com.

‘Why Don’t You Come for Me?’ by Diane Janes

Published by Constable,
24 March 2011.
ISBN:  978-1-84901-596-7 (HB)

Although now settled and happy with her new husband Marcus, Jo is still haunted by the abduction of her baby daughter Lauren, nine years ago.

Jo and Marcus now live in Cumbria. Together they founded M H Tours, which has proved incredibly successful, so much so that they have recently merged with another tour company.  The result of the merger is that there is now a third director – Melissa. Originally Jo and Marcus had organised and conducted the tours between them, but Marcus’s son hates his mother’s new partner and so fourteen-year-old Sean has come to  live with them, and, as Marcus explains to Jo, with Melissa being able to take over some of the tours Jo will be able to be at home with Sean.

On the face of it all is normal, when some of the tours that Jo was to take are given to Melissa the reasoning appears sound or is it. Jo is still getting postcards with photos of baby Lauren and the message ‘I still have her’ but the police have long given up trying to trace the source, and there has been suggestion that maybe Jo is sending them herself!

The mounting tension and the strain on Jo’s relationships with Marcus and those around her are skilfully handled. Jo struggles valiantly to keep her foothold and tell herself everything is OK, but as a reader virtually watching her desperate struggle to hold onto normality was painful. The disintegration of Jo is masterly, I kept turning pages back and thinking ‘could she have done anything different that would make her look less off the wall, but the pressure was relentless, and almost frighteningly transparent.

The climax is shocking, more I will not say. But read this excellent piece of compelling writing for yourself. Highly recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Diane Janes was born and educated in Birmingham, but lived in various parts of the north of England for most of her adult life, until recently moving to Devon. Having worked in everything from mortgages to engineering, she is now a full time author of fiction and investigative non-fiction, specialising in crime. When still an unpublished writer, she was short listed twice for the Crime Writers' Association Debut Dagger and in 2010 was among the quartet of finalists in contention for the John Creasey Dagger. She is published in both the U.K. and the U.S.A. and some of her work has been translated into German and Japanese.

http://www.dianejanes.50webs.com/

‘When the Thrill is Gone’ by Walter Mosley

Published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson,
28 April 2011.
ISBN: 978-0-297-86547-6 (PB)

This is the third in the series featuring Leonid McGill an ex-boxer turned PI. With the economic recession times are hard for everyone and Leonid is having trouble finding the rent, so the appearance of the beautiful Mrs Chrystal Tyler offering him a stack of money to protect her against her rich husband whose former two ex-wives are dead but not from natural causes is a case he cannot turn down. But he has a bad feeling about it – things don’t stack up, so he does some digging, with surprising results.

Leonid is fifty-one-years-old, with a chequered personal life. His wife Karen is playing around with younger man. His stepson Twill is leaning towards a life of crime, and his other son Dimitri is also giving cause for concern. And sadly, his old friend Gordo, also an ex-boxer is dying of cancer.

A request from the gangster Harris Vartan, a former colleague of his father’s has Leonid looking for his angle. Leonid suspects a hidden agenda but in memory of his father he hesitates to say no.

Whilst pursuing the interests of his moneyed client, which bring him into contact with his ex-girlfriend Aura, his missing persons case produces some surprising revelations.

Written in the first person, the narrative is peppered with the wisdom of Leonid’s father Tolstoy McGill. As the story progresses, we learn that Leonid has a criminal related past which he is now doing his best to re-dress, or maybe atone is a better description, producing a feel-good factor book. If the character of Leonid McGill has a flaw it seems to be related to his height, we learn early on that he is of short statue, or in this pc world maybe I should say virtually challenged. In any confrontation, and there are many, he draws attention to his own lack of height but his incredible power and strength, once or twice would have been enough.

The story is rich in well-developed characters that leap off the page. The writing is marvellous, and I am amazed to learn that this writer has written thirty-five books, and this is the first I have read – something to remedy. Highly recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Walter Mosley is one of America's most celebrated and beloved writers. His books have won numerous awards and have been translated into more than twenty languages. Mosley is the author of the acclaimed Easy Rawlins series of mysteries, including national bestsellers Cinnamon Kiss, Little Scarlet, and Bad Boy Brawly Brown; the Fearless Jones series, including Fearless Jones, Fear Itself, and Fear of the Dark; the novels Blue Light and RL's Dream; and two collections of stories featuring Socrates Fortlow, Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned, for which he received the Anisfield-Wolf Award, and Walkin' the Dog. He lives in New York City.

‘The Judas Heart’ by Ingrid Black

Read by Tara Ward
Published by ISIS Audio Books.
1 December 2007.
ISBN: 978-0-7531-2891-6 (11 CD’S)
Published by Penquin in Paperback
2 October 2007.
ISBN: 978-0-14192530-8

When former FBI agent Saxon sees the face of her colleague ex-agent Leon Kaminski in a bookshop she is transported back to the last time she had seen Kaminski, then as now, he placed his finger to his lips in a shushing motion and then just disappeared.   But this time things are very different because Saxon is in Dublin and a call to another ex-colleague elicits the information that Leon Kaminski is indeed missing not for the first time but following his wife’s murder he seems to have dropped completely out of sight. Saxon decides to track him down.

Meanwhile Superintendent Grace Fitzgerald, Saxon’s partner, has a new boss, one who is keen to tap into Saxon expertise in their murder hunt for the killer of Marsha Reed. Investigation into the death of Marsha Reed produces many lines of enquiry, some linked with the theatre world, and some disturbingly leading in the direction of Leon Kaminski.

I have enjoyed the all the books in this series, but this one in particular as it was a good mystery that kept me guessing, and as it was read by Tara Ward who has a lovely voice. She also did an excellent job with the different Irish accents - Fitzgerald’s soft lilt and Stella’s harsh northern accent. A superb job.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Ingrid Black is the pseudonym of Eilis O'Hanlon and Ian McConnel, a husband-and-wife writing team who live with their family in Belfast, Northern Ireland. They are the creators of ‘Saxon and Grace Fitzgerald’, former FBI agent and Detective Chief Superintendent with the Dublin Metropolitan Police’s Murder Squad.

‘The Company of Shadows’ by Ruth Newman

Published by Simon & Schuster,
8 July 2010.
ISBN: 978-1-84737-727-2

Today it’s one year - Kate Benson is still just making it through each day, having dreams every night about her dead husband. David and Samantha, her friends are supportive trying to get her interested in anything, even their holiday snaps. As Kate listlessly flips through them, she sees in the background of a photograph taken in a restaurant, her husband Charlie.

Whilst her friends say they can see a likeness they say it cannot be him, but Kate is certain it is, and is ready to fly out that night. Her friends urge caution and eventually Charlie’s best friend Luke agrees to accompany her to Miami.

Despite being constantly told it could not possibly be him, Kate is determined to track down the man in that photograph. As she follows the trail, she begins to question the circumstances of her husband’s death, and also the people she trusts, or can she trust them?

This is one of those books you cannot put down. A fascinating mystery. Highly recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Ruth Newman lives in Cambridge where she works as a Web editor for the University Business School. 

Writing Experiences of an Ex-Pat: The Big ‘What if….’

 

by Jill Amadio

..........offers writers a limitless world of characters, plots, settings, and time frames, a chance to change history, to bend it a little. What if Henry VIII died at birth? What if General William Sherman never undertook his famous March to the Sea? Shakespeare would have been deprived of many of the plots for his plays and Scarlett O’Hara would have had no reason to be created by Margaret Mitchell.

The good news is, much of our past provides those who write historical fiction with stepping off points for their novels, with real characters who resound throughout the ages but can be given sham qualities they never possessed in real life.

Yet, how much twisting of the truth do these books require to suit the author’s fictional story? Is it a dilemma, a difficult choice, or a decision to blithely rewrite history? For those writing non-fiction, do the same criteria apply.

The case of James Frey comes to mind as I mention it in my new novel that is – surprise! – based on a true story. Frey’s memoir, “a Million Little Pieces,” was revealed as fake although he was reported to have asked his
publisher to release the book as a novel. However, Random House decided sales would be greater as a true story. To his credit Frey admitted he fabricated and exaggerated parts of the book.

Which brings me to a personal point regarding fiction, non-fiction, and writing the truth. A few months after September 11, 2001 I was approached by a young woman who said she had been married to one of the hijackers. She wished to tell her story.  As a ghostwriter I published several memoirs, biographies, and autobiographies under my clients’ names.

Long story short, I wrote the book for her. Then I printed it out and slipped it into a drawer. I didn’t look at it either in hard copy or digital form but kept the document on my laptop and on a thumb drive during all the years since.

The pandemic, forcing writers into greater isolation than usual, and for more than a year, has changed our way of life, and in my case, shredded any writerly income I was making as a hired hand. During those 13 months I thought about books I’d written and set aside, and decided to take a second look at the 9/11 story.

 For several reasons I decided to turn the true story into as a novel. Luckily, I had retained all the documents including the marriage certificate, divorce decree, photos of her with the Said Arabian she married at 17 years old, and cassette recordings of her and her family. I also had written a 40-paqge non-fiction book proposal which resulted in my being signed up by a top New York literary agent. It was 13 months after the 9/11 attacks. However, the upshot was that no publisher would touch it.  The agent suggested they were afraid of reprisals because the book provides a rare, under-the-radar- glimpse into the terrorists’ personal lives in America, their loves of strip clubs and pizza, for instance, and the kinds of activities that should have served as red flags to law enforcement agencies.

Turning the non-fiction story into fiction was easy. I had all the background I needed both on tape, with photos, and in documents. With Frey’s experience in mind I was careful to stick to the truth to back everything up but as the book was fiction, who would worry about its origin? The subtitle clearly states that the book is based on a true story.

Over the past two weeks I have received glowing reviews, all 5-star to date, and my dear neighbor, a retired CEO of a large company who writes a newsletter, said he’d be happy to give it some space. He added as an afterthought that he would have to write the subtitle’s word “True” in quotes in his newsletter. He did not believe any of it happened, that it was too far-fetched. At first I remonstrated, then told him I really didn’t care if he believed it or not. I knew the truth. I also told him he’d be mis-quoting the subtitle if he changed it to his personal preference.

Which brings me back to the point of authors taking actual history, or history as reported, and to make a book more interesting, more readable as some of our greatest writers have. There are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of books currently out there with the “Based on a True Story” subtitle.  Is there a lesson here?  

In Terror's Deadly Clasp
Published 16 July 2021

A leggy wildflower of a girl, teenage Sofia runs away from rural Oregon to big city Portland where she meets and marries a charismatic
Saudi Arabian later known as 9/11 hijacker #13.
While a slumbering America embraces feng sui and pizza she is present when terrorist sleeper cells are organized in her home, maps of
landmark buildings, airports, and bridges are studied, and teams of recruits take flying lessons.
In Terror’s Deadly Clasp is based on her true story, providing a rare, chilling glimpse under the radar of the terrorists’ daily lives as they enjoy strip clubs, fast food, and freedom from their religious rules.
After warning the FBI of the Arabs’ photo sessions, driving several men into America illegally from Mexico, and other suspicious
activities, she goes undercover for U.S. intelligence agencies with deadly consequences.

 http://jillamadiomysteries.com/