Review: GOOD GIRL, BAD GIRL, Michael Robotham

• format: Kindle (Amazon)
• File Size: 746 KB
• Print Length: 416 pages
• Publisher: Sphere (July 23, 2019)
• Publication Date: July 23, 2019
• Sold by: Hachette Book Group
• Language: English
• ASIN: B07NLDBCD4

Synopsis (Amazon)

The girl with no past.

Six years ago, Evie Cormac was discovered, filthy and half-starved, hiding in a secret room in the aftermath of a shocking crime. Now approaching adulthood, Evie is damaged, self-destructive and has never revealed her true identity.

The boy who survived.

Forensic psychologist Cyrus Haven, a man haunted by his own past, is investigating the death of champion figure-skater Jodie Sheehan. When Cyrus is called upon to assess Evie, she threatens to disrupt the case and destroy his ordered life. Because Evie has a unique and dangerous gift - she knows when someone is lying. And nobody is telling the truth.

My take

We seem to have waited a while for another offering by Robotham but I don't think readers will be disappointed.

Robotham has moved away from the Joe O'Loughlin series and it remains to be revealed whether this is the beginning of a new series.

The new novel is set in Nottingham. 
The body of young Jodie Sheehan has been found murdered. Jodie was a figure skater apparently headed for the Olympics. Cyrus Haven attempts to profile the sort of person involved in Jodie's death. The police quickly come up with a suspect, but things don't quite jell for Cyrus. Cyrus asks question about Jodie which others have been reluctant to ask.

The second major plot line is the story of Angel Face, the little girl found six years earlier hiding in a house with the dead body of a man who had been tortured. She has refused to tell the police her real name or her age, but now she claims to be nearly 18, and that she should be released from institution she is living in. Cyrus is asked to assess her for potential release.

The plot lines progress together, each adding to the other, with new sub-plots giving the whole novel depth. And then the major lines cross each other.

A really good read full of twists and turns. Even half-way through I really couldn't tell where we were headed.

My rating: 4.8

I have also read
BOMBPROOF
SHATTER #3
SHATTER (audio)
BLEED FOR ME #4
5.0, THE WRECKAGE #5
4.8, SAY YOU'RE SORRY #6
5.0, WATCHING YOU #7
4.8, IF I TELL YOU... I'LL HAVE TO KILL YOU (edit)
5.0, LIFE OR DEATH Shortlisted for the 2015 CWA Gold Dagger
4.8, CLOSE YOUR EYES
5.0, THE SECRETS SHE KEEPS
5.0, THE SUSPECT #1 (audio)
4.8, LOST #2 (audio)
5.0, THE OTHER WIFE

Review: AN UNWANTED GUEST, Shari Lapena

• this edition published by Penguin UK 2018
• ISBN 978-0-5930-7965-2
• 292 pages
• source: my local library

Synopsis (Fantastic Fiction)

We can't choose the strangers we meet.

As the guests arrive at beautiful, remote Mitchell's Inn, they're all looking forward to a relaxing weekend deep in the forest, miles from anywhere. They watch their fellow guests with interest, from a polite distance.

Usually we can avoid the people who make us nervous, make us afraid.

With a violent storm raging, the group finds itself completely cut off from the outside world. Nobody can get in - or out. And then the first body is found . . . and the horrifying truth comes to light. There's a killer among them - and nowhere to run.

Until we find ourselves in a situation we can't escape. Trapped.

My take

For me this was a one sitting book.

It is almost a locked room mystery. A group of people staying in a remote boutique hotel, seemingly not knowing anyone except the person they arrived with. There is an engaged couple a few weeks away from their wedding, a man whose wife was murdered a few years before, a couple whose marriage has almost run its course, and yet another couple who have been together for a while but who in reality know very little about each other. Two women are lucky to have arrived after their car slid off the road on the ice. The hotel is cut off in a snow storm and there is no phone, and eventually no power. But two of them recognise someone they know among the others.

The first body is discovered at the foot of the stairs the next morning, but the murderer is not obvious.

A well constructed mystery and an excellent read.

My rating: 4.6

I've also read
4.5, A STRANGER IN THE HOUSE

Review: THE WYCH ELM, Tana French

• format: Kindle (Amazon)
• Paperback: 528 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Books; Reprint edition (July 30, 2019)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0735224641
• ISBN-13: 978-0735224643

Synopsis (Fantastic Fiction)

WHAT DO WE HIDE INSIDE OURSELVES?

One night changes everything for Toby. He's always led a charmed life - until a brutal attack leaves him damaged and traumatised, unsure even of the person he used to be. He seeks refuge at his family's ancestral home, the Ivy House, filled with memories of wild-strawberry summers and teenage parties with his cousins.

But not long after Toby's arrival, a discovery is made: a skull, tucked neatly inside the old wych elm in the garden.

As detectives begin to close in, Toby is forced to examine everything he thought he knew about his family, his past, and himself.

A spellbinding book from a novelist who takes crime writing and turns it inside out, The Wych Elm asks what we become, and what we're capable of, if we no longer know who we are.

My take

An enthralling and very complex book.

Toby didn't really want to return to the Ivy House and he wasn't really sure why. After he was attacked at home and beaten almost to death, his memory had great holes. But the family thought that going to stay at the Ivy House would help in his recuperation and also solve the problem of someone being there to look after Hugo.

The discovery of the skull hidden in the wych elm changes all that and becomes a pivotal point in the novel. How recent is the skull? The elm has been there about 200 years. But then the identity of the skull is discovered and the question becomes one of who put it there. Toby realises it must be someone he knows and he is not even sure it isn't himself.

There is no getting away from the fact that this is a long book. It is made to feel longer by the fact that it seems to take so long to get wherever it is going,  and for much of the time the reader is not sure what the outcome will be.  You are not really sure of how much detail you need to hang onto. And some of the main characters are simply unlikeable. I even felt ambivalent about Toby himself. I kept thinking about how unobservant and self-absorbed he must have been when he was younger. And then, we are nearly at the end when something quite awful and unpredictable happens.

My rating: 4.5

I've also read
4.3, THE LIKENESS
4.8, THE SECRET PLACE

Review: NIGHT OVER WATER, Ken Follett - audio

• Audible Audiobook
• Listening Length: 18 hours and 41 minutes
• Program Type: Audiobook
• Version: Unabridged
• Publisher: Macmillan Digital Audio
• Narrator: Russell Bentley
• Audible.com.au Release Date: 23 August 2018

Synopsis (Amazon)

Set during the outbreak of the Second World War, Night over Water is a feat of storytelling from the best-selling master of the historical thriller, Ken Follett.

On a bright September morning in 1939, two days after Britain has declared war, a group of privileged but desperate people gather in Southampton to board the largest, most luxurious airliner ever built - the Pan American Clipper, bound for New York: an English aristocrat, fleeing with his family and a fortune in jewels; a German scientist, escaping from the Nazis; a murderer under FBI escort; a young wife running away from a domineering husband; and a handsome, unscrupulous thief....

My Take

War has just been declared and there are a number of people desperate to leave England for America. The novel tells the stories of these people, and why they want to leave, in a number of plot strands. Amid these strands a crew member's wife is abducted and he is under pressure to bring the flying boat down just off the New England coast.

The tension grows as the plane approaches the American coastline, but meanwhile we have learnt a lot about this luxurious airliner, and the details feel very authentic.

There are 15 discs in the set, with each running for a little over an hour. Takes up a lot of listening time.

I could have done without the gratuitous sex which felt a bit sleazy.

My rating: 4.4

I've also read WORLD WITHOUT END (Audio CD)

Review: THE DAY THE LIES BEGAN, Kylie Kaden

• NB Book not released until August 19, 2019 - available for pre-order
• source: Netgalley 
• format: Kindle (Amazon)
• File Size: 2208 KB
• Print Length: 344 pages
• Publisher: Pantera Press (August 19, 2019)
• Publication Date: August 19, 2019
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
• Language: English
• ASIN: B07SMBVNDB

Synopsis  (Amazon)

‘It seemed simple at first - folding one lie over the next. She had become expert at feathering over the cracks to ensure her life appeared the same. But inside, it didn’t feel fixed.’

It happened the day of the Moon Festival. It could have been left behind, they all could have moved on with their lives. But secrets have a habit of rising to the surface, especially in small towns.

Two couples, four ironclad friendships, the perfect coastal holiday town. With salt-stung houses perched like lifeguards overlooking the shore, Lago Point is the scene of postcards, not crime scenes. Wife and mother Abbi, town cop Blake, schoolteacher Hannah and local doctor Will are caught in their own tangled webs of deceit.

When the truth washes in to their beachside community, so do the judgements: victim, or vigilante, who will forgive, who will betray? Not all relationships survive. Nor do all residents.

My take

Abbi and foster brother Blake have a secret that dominates the first half of this book. We are not sure what it is - several alternatives are on offer - but it is something they shouldn't have done, something that will devastate those close to them, and something that will destroy them both if it becomes known. But they both doubt their ability to keep it hidden.

It turns out that even though they didn't know it these families have lived with lies and secrets all their lives. Once Abbi and Blake's big secret is "out" nothing is the same.

The structure of the novel is quite confusing at the beginning and then intriguing as the setting swaps between the present and the day and night of the Moon Festival.


My rating: 4.4

About the author:
Since being plucked from the Random House slushpile, Brisbane writer Kylie Kaden is now an internationally published author of women’s fiction (when she’s not wrangling her sticky brood of boys). Kylie followed her breakthrough debut Losing Kate, with another critically acclaimed suspenseful read, Missing You, in 2015.

Review: A KEEPER, Graham Norton

• this edition published by Hodder & Stoughton 2018
• ISBN 978-1-473-66489-2
• 326 pages
• source: my local library

Synopsis (publisher)

From the bestselling author of HOLDING comes a masterly tale of secrets and ill-fated loves set on the coast of Ireland.

Dear Lonely Leinster Lady,
I'm not really sure how to begin . . .

The truth drifts out to sea, riding the waves out of sight. And then the tide turns.

Elizabeth Keane returns to Ireland after her mother's death, intent only on wrapping up that dismal part of her life. There is nothing here for her; she wonders if there ever was. The house of her childhood is stuffed full of useless things, her mother's presence already fading. And perhaps, had she not found the small stash of letters, the truth would never have come to light.

40 years earlier, a young woman stumbles from a remote stone house, the night quiet but for the tireless wind that circles her as she hurries further into the darkness away from the cliffs and the sea. She has no sense of where she is going, only that she must keep on.

This compelling new novel confirms Graham Norton's status as a fresh, literary voice, bringing his clear-eyed understanding of human nature and its darkest flaws.

My Take

When Elizabeth Keane returned to Ireland to close up her mother's house she thought she knew who she was, although her mother had been a single parent, and Elizabeth had never seen her father. Her mother had said he was dead.

But then a bundle of letters reveals a strange courtship between her mother and father and Elizabeth feels the need to visit the place where she was born.

The story is told in two main time frames, the present day and four decades earlier when her mother Patricia apparently put an advertisement in the Lonely Hearts column of a farming journal. The narration easily slips between current time and the time when the letters were written.

A very enjoyable read, on the outer edges of crime fiction.

My rating: 4.6

About the author
Graham Norton is one of the UK's best loved broadcasters. He presents The Graham Norton Show on BBC1 and has a weekly show on BBC Radio 2. He is the winner of nine BAFTA awards. Born in Dublin and raised in West Cork, Norton now lives in London.
His debut novel Holding was a commercial and critical success, winning Norton the Irish Independent Popular Fiction award at the Bord Gais Irish Book Awards in 2016.

 

Review: THE SUSPECT, Fiona Barton

• this edition published by Penguin UK 2019
• ISBN 978-1-787-63023-9
• 377 pages
• source: my local library

Synopsis (publisher)

The New York Times bestselling author of The Widow returns with a brand new novel of twisting psychological suspense about every parent’s worst nightmare…

When two eighteen-year-old girls go missing in Thailand, their families are thrust into the international spotlight: desperate, bereft, and frantic with worry. What were the girls up to before they disappeared?

Journalist Kate Waters always does everything she can to be first to the story, first with the exclusive, first to discover the truth—and this time is no exception. But she can’t help but think of her own son, whom she hasn’t seen in two years, since he left home to go travelling.

As the case of the missing girls unfolds, they will all find that even this far away, danger can lie closer to home than you might think…

My take

It has always been Alex O'Connor's dream to travel to Thailand in a gap year after her A-levels. When her best friend Mags pulls out, her trip is in jeopardy but Rosie, a girl she walks to school with, begs to be Mags' replacement. Alex feels she doesn't know Rosie very well, but when Rosie comes through with the fare, it looks like everything will work out.

Alex's parents haven't heard from the girls for a week nearly 3 weeks after they left for Bangkok. They had been receiving regular updates from Alex and then nothing, So they decide to report it to the British police. Alex had been updating their FaceBook page every day and sending photos from her phone, and everything was great. But, unknown to them, the story that she is telling Mags by email is very different..

Kate Waters is a journalist with The Post. Her son Jake dropped out of uni and went to Phuket to "find himself" two years ago. Since then she and her husband Malcolm have hardly heard from Jake. When the story of the two missing girls lands on her desk, she understand what the parents are going through. When the opportunity comes to go to Thailand to follow the story she jumps at the chance, hoping she will also find Jake.

It never occurs to Alex's parents that what they are hearing from Alex isn't true. Every parent thinks they know their child and believes they would know what to do if things went wrong. But what if, half a world away, they see reporting problems as failure? What if the responsibility is too much?

A very good read. A parent's worst nightmare.

My rating: 4.5

I've also read: 4.8, THE WIDOW

About the author

Fiona Barton, the New York Times bestselling author of The Widow and The Child, trains and works with journalists all over the world. Previously, she was a senior writer at the Daily Mail, news editor at the Daily Telegraph, and chief reporter at the Mail on Sunday, where she won Reporter of the Year at the British Press Awards.