Category: 3 Star

TITLE: The Next Widow
SERIES #: Jericho And Wright #1
CHARACTERS: Jericho & Wright
AUTHOR: C.J. Lyons
PUBLICATION DATE: 07/28/20
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
A gripping crime thriller with unputdownable suspense

In the distance Leah heard sirens. She ignored them. Right now, her daughter needed her and Emily was just out of reach, curled up under the bed, her eyes closed, desperately shaking. Leah did the only thing any mother would do. She crawled through the blood to get to her daughter.

Dr Leah Wright returned to her childhood home in rural Pennsylvania with her husband to find peace and quiet, start afresh and raise her six-year-old daughter Emily. But when she gets home one dark winter night, clutching roses in her hand, she finds her daughter huddled under her bed and her husband’s blood all over the floor…

When Detective Luka Jericho is called to investigate, he’s shocked to learn that the killer left a witness behind – the victim’s young daughter. The scene is a painful reminder of his fiancé’s unsolved death, and he is desperate to find out what Emily saw that night. He knows that the killer could still be out there, waiting to strike again.

But growing up, Leah learned the hard way that the only person she could rely on was herself. And it’s not until she and Emily are attacked again that she realizes just how close the killer is. Can she trust Luka to keep her daughter safe?

REVIEW:
2.75 Hearts The story was a bit too predictable for me. I figured it out pretty quickly but continued to read in case I was mistaken and I wanted to know the reason. I was a bit disappointed.

The story drags a bit in some parts. There was enough interest to keep me reading but if not for my curiosity to be sure I had it right I wouldn’t have bothered.

I liked Detective Luka Jericho but wasn’t thrilled with Dr Leah Wright. She just wasn’t my cup of tea.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: Dark Hollow
CHARACTERS: Jacob Reese
AUTHOR: Steve Frech
PUBLICATION DATE: 12/06/19
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
Your past is catching up with you.
Jacob Reese enjoys the quiet life, running a coffee shop and renting out his cottage in The Hollows, Vermont.
But the calm is shattered when a woman who looks eerily similar to his ex-girlfriend Laura turns up to stay in the cottage, and leaves a mysterious note in the guest book.
Now Jacob’s seeing Laura everywhere—a glimpse of her face across the street, her music box left outside his house, a gift he gave her years before hanging from the trees.
But it can’t be Laura. Because Laura’s dead.
A gripping, twisted and haunting thriller. Fans of Gillian Flynn, Gregg Olsen and Mark Edwards will love Steve Frech.

REVIEW:
3.5 Hearts So I am a bit on the fence about this. This book was not what I thought it would be and so maybe my preconceived notions caused me to think differently about the way I am reviewing it.

The story was good. The suspense was interesting but I really wanted it to be something more. Where was the eeriness that the cover made it seem like it would have. I hoped for a ghost story or some kind of mystery since Laura is dead and yet it seems she has just come to the cottage.

I will give the author another try and I do not say this often but may even go back and re-read this later to see if I have a different feel now that I know what the story is really about.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: Girl Walking Alone
SERIES #: Jessie Tucker Mystery #1
CHARACTERS: Jessie Tucker
AUTHOR: Dana Perry
PUBLICATION DATE: 11/20/19
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
I thought about Margaret Kincaid lying there in Central Park. A woman in the wrong place at the wrong time on a hot summer night. And now she was dead. It could have been me. It nearly was.

At thirty-six, Jessie Tucker is a well-respected crime reporter and even a local hero, after a brutal attack twelve years ago left her so broken that doctors said she’d never walk again. These days, she’s still got the scars but is back on her feet – determined to cover the cases other reporters can’t stomach.

But when Margaret Kincaid’s murder file lands on her desk, Jessie has to pause. She still has nightmares about her attack, and the details of Margaret’s case are too familiar. Night falling over the park, girl walking alone, and a stranger waiting in the trees ahead… just for her, or for an unlucky anyone? They might never know.

Then the police gun down their top suspect and it seems the mystery will die with him. But something tells Jessie that the police got it wrong: the real killer is still out there, poised to strike again. It’s up to Jessie to put together the pieces before he finds his next victim… but in the shadowy depths of Central Park will Jessie uncover far more than she bargained for?

REVIEW:
3.5 Hearts This is a new series about Jessie Tucker who is a crime reporter after being attacked years ago she wants to get justice for those that attack others. She clamps on to the murder file of Margaret Kincaid which has similar details to her own attack so she goes out on her own to find out what happened to Margaret.

I liked Jessie even though there are a few times I wanted to roll my eyes at her. And just like shows on tv somehow the copus can not solve it but a reporter can just doesn’t always work for me.

There are a few sex scenes that ar3e explicit and make me think they were thrown in for erotica value when it really wasn’t needed.

As with any first in a series there is a lot just to get to know the characters. I will give the next in the series to try to see if there is more depth to the story.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: They Did Bad Things
CHARACTERS: a number of characters
AUTHOR: Lauren A Forry
PUBLICATION DATE: 06/02/20
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
And Then There Were None meets The Last Time I Lied in this dark and twisty psychological thriller.

In 1995, six university students moved into the house at 215 Caldwell Street. Months later, one of them was found dead on the sofa the morning after their end-of-year party. His death was ruled an accident by the police. The remaining five all knew it wasn’t, and though they went on with their lives, the truth of what happened to their sixth housemate couldn’t stay buried forever.

Twenty years later, all five of them arrive—lured separately under various pretenses—at Wolfheather House, a crumbling, secluded mansion on the Scottish isle of Doon. Trapped inside with no way out and no signal to the outside world, the now forty-somethings fight each other—and the unknown mastermind behind their gathering—as they confront the role they played in their housemate’s death. They are given one choice: confess to their crimes or die.

They Did Bad Things is a deviously clever psychological thriller about the banality of evil and the human capacity for committing horror.

REVIEW:
2.75 Hearts Boy was this book hard to get into. To tell the truth if not for the reviews saying the end got better I would have set this book aside. But I will say it did get better but not good in my opinion.

Something was very off in this story. First off I didn’t like any of the characters. I mean none of them. I never cared what happened or why. The story was so jumpy that it was distracting. I do not mind a back and forth between time periods but this seemed (not really but it did seem) to jump every other paragraph.

I will admit that like the other reviews said it got better in the end. But by then I just didn’t care what was going on.

Just not my thing I guess.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: A Mother’s Lie
CHARACTERS: Beth & Dana
AUTHOR: Sarah Zettel
PUBLICATION DATE: 04/07/20
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
A compulsive family drama about a mother’s desperate search to reclaim her daughter from the horrors of her own past, perfect for fans of Then She Was Gone.
Beth Fraser finally has her life together. She’s built a successful career in the tech sector, has a bright fifteen-year-old daughter, and she’s completely erased all evidence of her troubled past. At least that’s what she thought.
Dana Fraser always wondered why she’s the only kid with two backup phones, emergency drills, and a non-negotiable check-in time every single day. When a stranger approaches her on the street claiming to be her grandmother, Dana starts to question what else her mother has been hiding.
Soon Beth’s worst nightmare is coming true: Dana is in grave danger, and unless Beth is willing to pull one last con job for her parents, she may never see her daughter again.

REVIEW:
This book was hard to decide on a rating so I went right down the middle. The story was interesting and I liked that the memories of Beth’s life wasn’t told in a matter of a few pages and those few pages affected her whole life. There is a slow unwind of Beth’s past which helps the reader understand why Beth is the way she is.

Now there is Dana who has no idea why her mother is the way she is and honestly I felt for Dana. Her mom is nuts in her opinion and would have long ago sent me out into my own world without my mother in it.

The story had me interested in the past but the end left me a bit bereft. It seemed so rushed.

A hard book to like but I didn’t dislike it. Does that make sense?

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: Have You Seen Me?
CHARACTERS: Ally Linden
AUTHOR: Kate White
PUBLICATION DATE: 04/28/20
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
From New York Times bestselling author Kate White comes a gripping novel about one woman’s dangerous quest to recover lost memories someone would rather she never find.

The key to her missing memories could bring relief—or unlock her worst nightmares.

On a cold, rainy morning, finance journalist Ally Linden arrives early to work in her Manhattan office, only to find that she’s forgotten her keycard and needs to have a colleague she’s never met let her in. When her boss finally arrives, he seems surprised to see her—because she hasn’t worked there in five years.

Ally knows her name, but little else, and it’s only after several hours in an emergency room and multiple interviews with the hospital psychiatrist that she begins to piece together important facts: she lives on the Upper West Side; she’s now a freelance personal finance journalist; she’s married to a lovely man named Hugh. But she still can’t recall what happened to her during the previous two days. When she learns that she’s experienced a dissociative fugue state, Ally tries to think of triggers and remembers that she’d been seeing a therapist about a traumatic event from her childhood, in which she came across evidence for a murder that was never solved.

Desperate to unearth answers, Ally focuses on figuring out where she spent the missing forty-eight hours. As ominous details of the two days pile up, so does the terrifying pressure: she must recover the time she lost before the time she has left runs out.

Featuring Kate White’s signature twists and turns, Have You Seen Me? is a harrowing read that will keep readers guessing until its shocking ending.

REVIEW:
2.75 Hearts I will be honest, I didn’t get it. I thought that the story was ok and thought I had it figured out. And I did figure out the who-dun-it but the why-do-it was so out of the blue that it just didn’t make sense.

I have read other books by White and remember enjoying them but it almost felt that White wanted to make sure you didn’t figure it out so much that the answer wasn’t just outside the box it wasn’t even in the delivery van.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

TITLE: Little Girl Tell Tales
CHARACTERS: Rosalie & Dallin
AUTHOR: Rachel Bennett
PUBLICATION DATE: 05/29/20
ORDER LINKS: Amazon | B&N

BOOK SYNOPSIS:
Some of the boggy ponds were so deep that if a girl stepped into one it would swallow her forever…

2004: Rosalie is walking through the wild wetland behind her mother’s home on the isolated Isle of Man when she stumbles across a body. Having strayed from the path and lost her brother, Dallin, it’s hours before she’s discovered, shaken and exhausted. With a reputation for telling stories, not many believe the little girl’s tale of the body in the marsh.

2019: Dallin, estranged from his family, returns unannounced with a woman named Cora by his side. Cora’s sister went missing fifteen years ago and she believes Rosalie was the one who found her. As dangerous secrets are unearthed, Cora and Rosalie start asking questions about a girl who some would rather keep buried…

REVIEW:
Rosalie gets lost as a little girl and finds a skeleton. Once she is home she tells about the skeleton but nothing is found after a search of the area.

Now Rosalie is an adult and has become a loner. She doesn’t want anyone in her life after losing the love of her life. But enter Dallin, her estranged brother, and his girlfriend who believes Rosalie’s story of the skeleton and wonder if it may be Cora’s sister. And who put the skeleton there all those years ago and what will they do to keep the skeleton hidden?

This was an easy read. Didn’t keep the pages turning for me but was interesting. I never really connected to the characters, especially Rosalie. But a story that is interesting.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.