Difference between revisions of "Newest Thrillers Reviews"

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[[Category:New Reviews|Thrillers]]__NOTOC__<!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->
 
[[Category:New Reviews|Thrillers]]__NOTOC__<!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->
 
{{Frontpage
 
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1780894511
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|isbn=0008379300
|title=Die Alone
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|title=The Shadow Man
|author=Simon Kernick
+
|author=Helen Fields
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Thrillers
 
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Ray Mason is in prison awaiting trial for murder and he's in the vulnerable prisoner unit: as a cop he's something of a target, but the unit is not as secure as the inmates would have hoped and Mason is injured in a riotOn his way to hospital he's broken free by armed men and an offer is made to him.  He's to assassinate the man who is likely to become the country's next prime minister and he'll then be given a new identity so that he can start afresh abroadHis captors say that they're MI6, but Mason has his doubtsHis choices are limited though and he has personal reasons to believe that it would be better if Alastair Sheridan was dead.
+
|summary=Fergus Ariss is in his late thirties and he knows that he's dyingHis body is giving up on him, his internal organs beginning to putrify but before he dies he wants a wife, a child and a brother.  He's been on the lookout for the perfect people and he's made certain preparationsThe flat where the family will live is prepared and even windows with curtains, and pictures in frames have been painted onto the walls.  Angela Fernycroft was to be his wifeHer husband, Cal, had taken the children - a boy of seven and a girl of five, away for the weekend.  Unfortunately, it doesn't go according to plan and Angela dies.
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{Frontpage
 
{{Frontpage
|author=Rory Clements
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|author=Dean Koontz
|title=Hitler's Secret
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|title=The Other Emily
|rating=3.5
+
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=Our hero David Thorne is an author, who shares his life between the two US coasts.  It's the western coast we're concerned with, a place he has to return to, and a place he has to be able to leave.  David lost contact with his partner there ten years ago, when she vanished from a remote road late at night.  He's paying for contact with the man he thinks the only suspect, a lifer now, who went a bit Hannibal Lecter, and has a dozen and more unfound Jane Does on his record.  David is trying to pry the connection between the murderer and his girl from the man's mind, but to no avail.  He's also having a recharge ready for his next hit novel when into the restaurant walks the sheer spitting image, the very embodiment, the virtual resurrection, of his love.  What is a man to do?
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|isbn=1542019958
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}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=1529124417
 +
|title=Before She Disappeared
 +
|author=Lisa Gardner
 +
|rating=4.5
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=Frankie Elkin found Lani Whitehorse's body in her car at the bottom of the lake.  She knew that the twenty-two-year-old waitress wouldn't have left her three-year-old daughter and run away.  Lani was the fourteenth missing person to be located by Frankie and now she's moving on again, this time to Boston where there's a strong Haitian community which was home to Angelique Lovelie Badeau until her disappearance eleven months ago. Frankie, middle-aged and white, gets a job and accommodation at Stoney's bar and sets out to investigate the community which is just about exclusively black.
 +
}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=B08CR3WNFT
 +
|title=The Therapist
 +
|author=B A Paris
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=When Leo Curtis found the house in The Circle, a gated community, Alice Dawson was in Venice.  Leo wanted to move quickly on the property as it was on the market at such a reasonable price that Alice wouldn't have to sell her cottage in Harlestone for them to be able to afford it.  Alice agreed - she was tired of their long-distance relationship.  Now they would be able to spend most of the week together instead of just the weekends.  Leo had some work done on the house: he made two bedrooms into one and although Alice knew that the house was stunning she just didn't feel comfortable there.
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}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author=Saima Mir
 +
|title=The Khan
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Crime
 +
|summary=Jia Khan has alway lived by the motto be twice as good as men and four times as good as white men. This has served her well in her rise through the criminal justice system and by the time she is called home for her sister's wedding after fifteen years in self-imposed exile, she is at the top of her game. Returning to the city of her birth, to old scars and fresh wounds, Jia must confront her past and reconcile her visions for the future with her sense of honour and duty.
 +
|isbn=1786079097
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=0008214468
 +
|title=A Time to Lie
 +
|author=Simon Berthon
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=A workman has a nasty surprise when he pulls a package out of an excavation on a building site.  It's wrapped in part of an old shower curtain and is a hand, severed above the wrist.  It's been there for about twenty-five to thirty-five years.
 +
 
 +
Robin Sandford - generally known as Robbie - is Prime Minister.  He's married to heiress Carol van Koon and they have two daughters, Becca and Bella.  Sandford's determined to be a better type of politician: he wants ''a government that is not just practically good, but morally good.''  One of the ways he's planning on going about this is to ban arms sales to dubious regimes.  Henry Morland-Cross, the Deputy Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer, wishes that he'd been warned about this: it's easy to see that he wouldn't have been in agreement.
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author= Gunnar Staalesen
 +
|title= Fallen Angels
 +
|rating= 2
 
|genre=Thrillers
 
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=So, Hitler had a secret?  Two, if you include the reproductive detail mentioned in a certain sing-song aspersion. But this is a secret that is counter to that, and in fact is a secret that Hitler himself doesn't even know about.  His neice, Geli Raubal, the attractive young woman he seemed to be very close to in the early 1930s, had had his daughter behind his back.  Protected under a false identity ever since, the girl is completely ignorant of her past, and the truth is a very rare thing. Martin Bormann, the 'gatekeeper' to Hitler and his right hand man, knows – and is desperately intent on wiping the slate clean and removing all connected with her existence from the Reich.  So it's down to Tom Wilde, an American history professor at Oxbridge, to go in and extract her, in this most shadowy race against time.
+
|summary=Varg Veum, lone wolf detective, is back. After attending a former friend's funeral, Veum catches up with old friends but soon historic grievances and wounds are opened and the sins of the past are exposed to the light of the present. A horrific murder threatens these tenuous bonds and Veum is thrust into an investigation to root out the clues hidden in his own history and to catch a killer.
|isbn=1838770275
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|isbn=1913193063
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{Frontpage
 
{{Frontpage
|author=Michael J Malone
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|author= Deborah O'Connor
|title=In The Absence of Miracles
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|title= The Captive
 +
|rating= 4
 +
|genre= Thrillers
 +
|summary=Hannah knows the cage, intimately. It lurks in the corner of her eye. Soon, it will be occupied. Then what? What if he speaks to her? What if he escapes? What if he hurts her? What if she hurts him?
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|isbn=1838772650
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=B087JXQ3JQ
 +
|title=The Long Dark Road
 +
|author=P R Black
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Thrillers
 
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=John Docherty's mother has been taken into a nursing home following a massive stroke. It is thought unlikely that she will ever be able to live independently again. Faced with having to sell the family home in order to pay for her nursing care, Docherty starts the clear out.   In the attic he finds a childhood picture of himself, holding a toddler – a toddler he knows nothing aboutHe also finds a blood-stained shoe.
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|summary=Two years ago Dr Georgia's Healey's nineteen-year-old university-student daughter went missing as she walked along the lonely A928 at Ferngate Bridge.  There was a furious storm going on and she'd already refused the offer of help from one man in a big vehicle.  We'll see - but no one else will know - that another car stops and Stephanie is bundled into the car and driven off.  There has been no sign of her - or her body - in the two years since. Georgia is back is Ferngate, determined to find out what happened and she's not going to be stopped.
|isbn=191237479X
+
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author= Susi Holliday
 +
|title= The Last Resort
 +
|rating= 3.5
 +
|genre= Thrillers
 +
|summary=A group of strangers gather on a private island. They have been invited to an all-expenses paid retreat to test a brand-new product from the mysterious Timeo Technology company. The group includes a games designer, social media influencer, gossip columnist and hedge fund manager. Everyone seems to have an area of expertise that makes their attendance necessary. All except Amelia whose presence is a mystery. We follow the group as they explore the island, and each other's histories and it becomes clear that they all have a dark secret they would rather keep hidden. As the clock ticks down, these well-kept secrets are revealed, and it soon becomes clear that this luxury retreat is really a gilded cage. In a race against time, Amelia must struggle to uncover the reason for her attendance and protect the rest of the guests from the increasingly sinister accidents that befall them. 
 +
|isbn=1542020018
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=0008330131
 +
|title=The Stolen Sisters
 +
|author=Louise Jensen
 +
|rating=3.5
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=When we start ''The Stolen Sisters'' we know that twenty-years on from a dreadful event they are all healthy adults.  Well, they're healthy in the physical sense, but Carly has trust issues, Leah has OCD and Marie drinks. They're the Sinclair sisters and one day they were all stolen.  Carly was thirteen-years-old and she was in charge of her sisters, the eight-year-old twins.  Much as she loved them Carly was desperate to get a text from Dean Malden and her mobile phone held her attention.  Leah and Marie were nattering about a lost ball and a fleece which had been left outside.  The gate wasn't shut properly and Bruno, their boxer dog, escapedAs the three girls went to chase after him they were snatched by two men.
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{Frontpage
 
{{Frontpage
|isbn=0692853545
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|author=Will Carver
|title=The Things We Do
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|title=Hinton Hollow Death Trip
|author=Kay Pfaltz
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Thrillers
 
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=It's 2015 and Dr Eleanor Hartley is a prison psychologist at the state penitentiary and she knows that her next patient is not going to be easy.  'Jane Doe' has been convicted of the murder of two men - one a police officer.  She pleaded guilty and since then has been silent: even her identity is in doubtShe was carrying identification as Jane Dunlap when she was arrested, but it's been proved to be false.  There seem to be no family or friends who are missing herEleanor's task is to get Jane talking, to find out why a seemingly normal young woman would murder two men.
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|summary= Hinton Hollow, population 5,120.  It sounds like one of those signs you see on improbably wide highways in America's mid-west, but this particular Hinton Hollow is a small town in Berkshire, EnglandDetective Sergeant Pace grew up here, until something happened and he ran away to the cityHe's running away again…only this time evil is following him and is going to touch just about everyone in town.
 +
|isbn=1913193306
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=0008378363
 +
|title=One Perfect Morning
 +
|author=Pamela Crane
 +
|rating=3.5
 +
|genre=Thrillers
 +
|summary=A husband is about to have his throat cut in his own bed.  To find out who - and why - we need to go back nine days and twenty years.
  
 +
Mackenzie, Robin and Lily met when they all went to the same college in Monroeville, Pennsylvania and twenty years later they're still the best of friends.  When they first met they called themselves the Spicier Girls as a nod to the famous girl band of the day.  Lily would be Adventure Spice, Robin the Homemaker and Mackenzie - well, Mackenzie would be the supporting actress in her own life.  She married Owen, her college sweetheart and they have a daughter, Aria, who's now fifteen-year-old.
 +
}}
 
{{Frontpage
 
{{Frontpage
|isbn=147117316X
+
|isbn=0751567426
|title=Guilty Not Guilty
+
|title=The Wicked Sister
|author=Felix Francis
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|author=Karen Dionne
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Thrillers
 
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=The Honourable William Herbert Millgate Gordon-Russell (Bill Russell to those who knew him well) was acting as a volunteer steward at Warwick Racecourse when he was told of the violent death of his much-loved wifeIt would get worse though: the successful insurance actuary would be accused of killing her and hounded by the mediaThen  he would lose his job and his home.  His best friends would turn against him, as they came to believe him guilty of the murderYet there was no really compelling evidence that he was guilty.
+
|summary=When we first meet Rachel Cunningham she's an inpatient at the Newberry Regional Mental Health Center in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.  She's twenty-six and has been there for fifteen years, convinced that she accidentally killed her mother when she was eleven-years-old and that her father then took the gun and killed himself.  Her sister, Diana, just twenty-years-old, was left at the family home, a lodge in the Upper Peninsula wilderness.  Rachel's very bright and although she's a voluntary patient at the Mental Health Center she remains there, feeling that this is what she deserves.  Perhaps, though, the circumstances are not as she remembers.
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}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=0008314721
 +
|title=Truth Be Told
 +
|author=Kia Abdullah
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Crime
 +
|summary=The Hadids are an ''effortful'' family.  Flowers are sent for the slightest problem or achievement: letters are sent to thank and this prompts a phone call in return.  There are two sons of the family, seventeen-year-old Kamran and sixteen-year-old Adam.  Their mother, Sofia, regrets that she didn't name them the other way round: 'Adam and Kamran' trips off the tongue so much more easily than 'Kamran and Adam'.  Sofia worries about that sort of thing.  Both boys go to the prestigious Hampton school, where they board, despite the school being less than ten miles from their Belsize Park home.  Kamran has a place at Oxford next year and all seemed to be going well until the night when he was raped.
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}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|author=Agnes Ravatn and Rosie Hedger (translator)
 +
|title=The Seven Doors
 +
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Crime
 +
|summary=Come here for a thriller that interestingly doesn't even try to suggest a genre of any kind until we're a full fifth of the way throughWe start with our couple, she a literature lecturer, he big in medical provision and decisions at the council, being forced to move out of their home, a building that had existed throughout her life since childhood and which they'd occupied for over thirty yearsThe building he's inherited, meanwhile, and which they let out to a single mother, is needed by their adult daughter, who quite blatantly says to its occupant 'take a hike, I'm moving in and you're moving out'.  Now, at this stage you may well, if you know this is a genre read, think it's going to be a throwback to those 'home invasion' thrillers Hollywood gave us in the 1980s, but noWe avoid genre completely, as I say – instead learning about Greek tragedy, in case that has any bearing on what happens here, and seeing how an older-middle aged couple live their lives.  Until at that twenty per cent stage we find something that raises an eyebrow as any crime book should – until the point where the evicted tenant is found to have completely vanished.
 +
|isbn=1913193381
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=1471179273
 +
|title=House of Correction
 +
|author=Nicci French
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Crime
 +
|summary=When we first meet Tabitha Hardy, she's in prison, on remand.  She's sharing a cell with Michaela, who's more caring than she first appears.  She delivers tough love and gets Tabitha eating and drinking - and encourages her to have a shower, unpleasant as the whole processes might beAnd how did Tabitha get here?  Well, on 21 December the body of Stuart Robert Rees was discovered in her garden shed by Andrew Kane, who was helping with the renovations to Tabitha's house.  So far as the police are concerned, Tabitha is the only person who could have killed Rees - and when they arrived at her house she was covered in his blood.
 
}}
 
}}
  
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Move on to [[Newest Travel Reviews]]
<!-- Adele Parks -->
 
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===[[Lies Lies Lies by Adele Parks]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
Simon Barnes had his first taste of beer in 1976 when he was just six years old.  Over the years it would become a habit and then a need.  By 2016 and with a wife and child of his own he was a functioning alcoholic - a fact known by everybody except Simon.  He's concentrating on wanting another child to complete his family.  His wife, Daisy, isn't worried.  They took a long time to conceive Millie, who's perfect in every way, so why tempt fate?  Simon's not inclined to let matters rest though and it's at a fertility clinic that he receives the news that will change all their lives: he's sterile. [[Lies Lies Lies by Adele Parks|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Lying Room by Nicci French]]===
 
 
 
[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
When we meet Neve Connolly it's pretty obvious that she has something to hide.  She crept into the house after midnight, carefully putting her clothes into the washing machine and she can't wait to get husband Fletcher and children Mabel, Connor and Rory off on their various ways the next morning when she gets a text telling her to come to the flat.  He has a few hours to spare and can't wait to see her.  Only, when she gets to the flat she finds Saul Stevenson, her boss and lover, dead on the floor.  The hammer that's been used on his brain is at his side. [[The Lying Room by Nicci French|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[In Her Eyes by Sarah Alderson]]===
 
 
 
[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
Ava lives a charmed life, but those things sometimes rub other people up the wrong way. One evening she returns from a night out with a friend, and before she can finish her bedtime routine, her home, and her life, are under attack: masked men have broken in and are demanding money from her husband, while her young daughter cowers beside him. In the scuffle than ensues, Ava is hurt, badly. When she wakes up in hospital she can barely remember what happened, but she knows it was life-changing. With her daughter still fighting for her life in a room down the corridor, Ava has a lot to contend with as she tries to recover, wills her daughter to recover, and attempts to piece together what happened and why. [[In Her Eyes by Sarah Alderson|Full Review]]
 
 
 
<!-- Steve Burrows -->
 
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[[image:1786075776.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1786075776/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]
 
 
 
 
 
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===[[A Dance of Cranes by Steve Burrows]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
DCI Domenic Jejeune is no longer with Lindy Hey, the estrangement being of his making, not hers.  He hasn't explained to her that he is doing this - and leaving for his native Canada - because he thinks that this will keep her safe from his nemesis, Ray Hayes.  Lauren Salter has been promoted to sergeant and now has her first murder case.  It looks as though there's an obvious suspect, but Salter isn't so certain.  Sgt Danny Maik is (unofficially) keeping an eye on Lindy Hey, whilst Jejeune embarks on a treacherous journey to rescue his brother, Damian, who has gone missing in one of Canada's largest national parks. [[A Dance of Cranes by Steve Burrows|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Triumph of the Spider Monkey by Joyce Carol Oates]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
 
 
 
Bobby is an angry, damaged man - damage that came from being abandoned as a baby in a bus station locker, and then being thrown from one foster home or detention centre to another, never far from violence or abuse. Eager to succeed as a musician, he arrives in Hollywood to find his dream - but it soon becomes clear that his paranoid delusions and seething rage will enable a capacity for acts of extreme violence. Unpublished for 40 years, this edition of ''The Triumph of the Spider Monkey'' comes combined with a connected novella – ''Love, Careless Love''. [[The Triumph of the Spider Monkey by Joyce Carol Oates|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Violet by S J I Holliday]]===
 
 
 
[[image:3.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
I've never been but understand that travelling is all about meeting new people and forming instantaneous bonds with people in often chance situations. Well that's exactly what happens when the two main/only characters meet in a travel agency in Beijing - Carrie is unsuccessfully trying to get a refund on an extra ticket for the Trans-Siberian train and Violet is trying to unsuccessfully buy a ticket for the same sold-out journey. As the two team up, travelling through Mongolia, Serbia and into Russia, it could've been the start of a beautiful friendship but this a thriller after all so it quickly becomes a tale of obsession, manipulation and toxic friendships. [[Violet by S J I Holliday|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Clear My Name by Paula Daly]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
Tess Gilroy works for Innocence UK, a charity investigating the cases of prisoners who can convince them that they've been wrongly convicted and they're just moving on to their next case.  She's somewhat surprised when Clive, the head of the charity, announces that she'll have someone shadowing her.  Avril's in her mid twenties and rather gauche as well as prone to putting her foot in it.  One of the reasons they're now going to look at the case of Carrie Kamara is that she's female and Innocence have never yet taken up the case of a woman: such impressions matter. [[Clear My Name by Paula Daly|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[A Nearly Normal Family by M T Edvardsson and Rachel Wilson-Boyles (translator)]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
We're going to hear this story through the viewpoints of three different people: Adam Sandell, his wife, Ulrika and his daughter Stella. Adam's a pastor in the Church of Sweden and Ulrika is a lawyer. Stella is, well, just difficult. You sense that she's always been difficult and there have even been occasions when Ulrika has let slip that she wishes that Stella was more like her best friend, Amina Bešic - and no one has ever said that if they don't think that the other person is better. We first meet the family on Stella's 18th birthday and we get a sense of Adam's controlling nature. Permission has to be given for a glass of wine for Stella at the celebration meal. [[A Nearly Normal Family by M T Edvardsson and Rachel Wilson-Boyles (translator)|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Joe Country (Jackson Lamb 6) by Mick Herron]]===
 
 
 
[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
I'd like to say that all the old crew are in Slough House but the rate of natural (or unnatural) wastage is such as to have Health and Safety worried.  Roderick Ho's there though, narcissistic as ever, and so's Louisa Guy.  She's getting over the death of Min Harper to the extent that she's not ''too'' concerned when she gets a phone call from Clare Harper, Min's wife.  River Cartwright has got death on his mind too, but in his case it's the impending demise of his beloved grandfather and former spook, the OB.  Diana Taverner has taken over from Claude Whelan as First Desk at Regent Park and she's going to make changes: one of the first is a shock.  An argument with Emma Flyte sees the head dog departing the service.  Meanwhile at Slough House, Catherine Standish is buying booze again, Jackson Lamb is offensive as ever and Shirley Dander and J K Coe do their best to remain unnoticed, the latter by saying nothing. [[Joe Country (Jackson Lamb 6) by Mick Herron|Full Review]]
 
 
 
<!-- Angie Kim -->
 
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===[[Miracle Creek by Angie Kim]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
The Yoo family originated in Seoul.  Yoo Young and her daughter Meh-hee came on ahead of the father of the family, Yoo Pak, as a couple in Baltimore offered to provide accommodation for Young and Meh-hee in exchange for assistance in their grocery store.  What Young had not appreciated was that she was to work from 6 a.m. until midnight, seven days a week.  For years she hardly saw her daughter except when the Kangs brought Meh-hee to see her at the store.  Meh-hee became Mary and struggled at school: her fellow pupils were no exceptions to the rule that children can be cruel and Mary was an easy target. [[Miracle Creek by Angie Kim|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Billion Pound Lie by Bill Dare]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
Can you imagine what it would be like to win a billion pounds? The UK's biggest ever lottery winners were a couple from Ayrshire, who won a £161 million EuroMillions jackpot a few years ago. That's so much money that it landed them on the Sunday Times Rich List of the UK's thousand most wealthy people. So a billion pounds. That's a lot, right? Can you imagine it?  What would you do? Would you try to remain anonymous? And, if you did, how would this affect your relationships with your nearest and dearest? What it would be like? How could you keep your friends and family from knowing that you were now one of the richest people in the country? [[The Billion Pound Lie by Bill Dare|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t With Her Mind by Jackson Ford]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
As the title suggests, this book is all about a girl, Teagan Frost, who has psychokinesis. Forced to secretly work for the government along with a few unique (and shady) individuals, Teagan has to use her power for unimaginable tasks. All of this whilst under the pretence of working for a moving-company. After her latest job goes wrong and her and the team escape by the skin of their teeth, Teagan finds herself as a murder suspect when the victim is found in such a way that only she could have committed the crime. The rest of the story unfolds in a fast-paced race against time to clear Teagan's name and find out exactly what has happened. Is it possible that someone with a gift like Teagan's has managed to fly under the radar? [[The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t With Her Mind by Jackson Ford|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Conviction by Denise Mina]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
It's strange how the worst of days can start in such an ordinary, mundane way.  And so it was for Anna McDonald as she sorted out gym kit and packed lunches for her two daughters.  It didn't begin to go wrong until she opened the door to her best friend, Estelle and realised that her husband was at the top of the stairs, dressed as though for a holiday rather than the work clothes she'd been expecting - and he was carrying a suitcase.  He and Estelle were leaving together - and they were taking Anna's two daughters with them.  There was another problem which neither Hamish nor Estelle knew about.  Anna wasn't actually Anna McDonald.  She was Sophie Bukaran, the woman who had been involved in the rape case against four footballers. [[Conviction by Denise Mina|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[No One Home by Tim Weaver]]===
 
 
 
[[image:3star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]
 
 
 
Long after the police have given up on cold missing persons cases, David Raker picks them up and tracks them down. He's called to a particularly disturbing case where a small village of nine people all vanished overnight two years ago. Raker and his associate must delve in to the lives of these people to work out how and why nine people have gone missing. They are being threatened to stop but something about the mystery keeps drawing Raker further in, putting him in personal peril. [[No One Home by Tim Weaver|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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Revision as of 12:09, 3 January 2021

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Review of

The Shadow Man by Helen Fields

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Fergus Ariss is in his late thirties and he knows that he's dying. His body is giving up on him, his internal organs beginning to putrify but before he dies he wants a wife, a child and a brother. He's been on the lookout for the perfect people and he's made certain preparations. The flat where the family will live is prepared and even windows with curtains, and pictures in frames have been painted onto the walls. Angela Fernycroft was to be his wife. Her husband, Cal, had taken the children - a boy of seven and a girl of five, away for the weekend. Unfortunately, it doesn't go according to plan and Angela dies. Full Review

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Review of

The Other Emily by Dean Koontz

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Our hero David Thorne is an author, who shares his life between the two US coasts. It's the western coast we're concerned with, a place he has to return to, and a place he has to be able to leave. David lost contact with his partner there ten years ago, when she vanished from a remote road late at night. He's paying for contact with the man he thinks the only suspect, a lifer now, who went a bit Hannibal Lecter, and has a dozen and more unfound Jane Does on his record. David is trying to pry the connection between the murderer and his girl from the man's mind, but to no avail. He's also having a recharge ready for his next hit novel when into the restaurant walks the sheer spitting image, the very embodiment, the virtual resurrection, of his love. What is a man to do? Full Review

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Review of

Before She Disappeared by Lisa Gardner

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Frankie Elkin found Lani Whitehorse's body in her car at the bottom of the lake. She knew that the twenty-two-year-old waitress wouldn't have left her three-year-old daughter and run away. Lani was the fourteenth missing person to be located by Frankie and now she's moving on again, this time to Boston where there's a strong Haitian community which was home to Angelique Lovelie Badeau until her disappearance eleven months ago. Frankie, middle-aged and white, gets a job and accommodation at Stoney's bar and sets out to investigate the community which is just about exclusively black. Full Review

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Review of

The Therapist by B A Paris

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When Leo Curtis found the house in The Circle, a gated community, Alice Dawson was in Venice. Leo wanted to move quickly on the property as it was on the market at such a reasonable price that Alice wouldn't have to sell her cottage in Harlestone for them to be able to afford it. Alice agreed - she was tired of their long-distance relationship. Now they would be able to spend most of the week together instead of just the weekends. Leo had some work done on the house: he made two bedrooms into one and although Alice knew that the house was stunning she just didn't feel comfortable there. Full Review

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Review of

The Khan by Saima Mir

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Jia Khan has alway lived by the motto be twice as good as men and four times as good as white men. This has served her well in her rise through the criminal justice system and by the time she is called home for her sister's wedding after fifteen years in self-imposed exile, she is at the top of her game. Returning to the city of her birth, to old scars and fresh wounds, Jia must confront her past and reconcile her visions for the future with her sense of honour and duty. Full Review

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Review of

A Time to Lie by Simon Berthon

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A workman has a nasty surprise when he pulls a package out of an excavation on a building site. It's wrapped in part of an old shower curtain and is a hand, severed above the wrist. It's been there for about twenty-five to thirty-five years.

Robin Sandford - generally known as Robbie - is Prime Minister. He's married to heiress Carol van Koon and they have two daughters, Becca and Bella. Sandford's determined to be a better type of politician: he wants a government that is not just practically good, but morally good. One of the ways he's planning on going about this is to ban arms sales to dubious regimes. Henry Morland-Cross, the Deputy Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer, wishes that he'd been warned about this: it's easy to see that he wouldn't have been in agreement. Full Review

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Review of

Fallen Angels by Gunnar Staalesen

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Varg Veum, lone wolf detective, is back. After attending a former friend's funeral, Veum catches up with old friends but soon historic grievances and wounds are opened and the sins of the past are exposed to the light of the present. A horrific murder threatens these tenuous bonds and Veum is thrust into an investigation to root out the clues hidden in his own history and to catch a killer. Full Review

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Review of

The Captive by Deborah O'Connor

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Hannah knows the cage, intimately. It lurks in the corner of her eye. Soon, it will be occupied. Then what? What if he speaks to her? What if he escapes? What if he hurts her? What if she hurts him? Full Review

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Review of

The Long Dark Road by P R Black

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Two years ago Dr Georgia's Healey's nineteen-year-old university-student daughter went missing as she walked along the lonely A928 at Ferngate Bridge. There was a furious storm going on and she'd already refused the offer of help from one man in a big vehicle. We'll see - but no one else will know - that another car stops and Stephanie is bundled into the car and driven off. There has been no sign of her - or her body - in the two years since. Georgia is back is Ferngate, determined to find out what happened and she's not going to be stopped. Full Review

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Review of

The Last Resort by Susi Holliday

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A group of strangers gather on a private island. They have been invited to an all-expenses paid retreat to test a brand-new product from the mysterious Timeo Technology company. The group includes a games designer, social media influencer, gossip columnist and hedge fund manager. Everyone seems to have an area of expertise that makes their attendance necessary. All except Amelia whose presence is a mystery. We follow the group as they explore the island, and each other's histories and it becomes clear that they all have a dark secret they would rather keep hidden. As the clock ticks down, these well-kept secrets are revealed, and it soon becomes clear that this luxury retreat is really a gilded cage. In a race against time, Amelia must struggle to uncover the reason for her attendance and protect the rest of the guests from the increasingly sinister accidents that befall them. Full Review

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Review of

The Stolen Sisters by Louise Jensen

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When we start The Stolen Sisters we know that twenty-years on from a dreadful event they are all healthy adults. Well, they're healthy in the physical sense, but Carly has trust issues, Leah has OCD and Marie drinks. They're the Sinclair sisters and one day they were all stolen. Carly was thirteen-years-old and she was in charge of her sisters, the eight-year-old twins. Much as she loved them Carly was desperate to get a text from Dean Malden and her mobile phone held her attention. Leah and Marie were nattering about a lost ball and a fleece which had been left outside. The gate wasn't shut properly and Bruno, their boxer dog, escaped. As the three girls went to chase after him they were snatched by two men. Full Review

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Review of

Hinton Hollow Death Trip by Will Carver

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Hinton Hollow, population 5,120. It sounds like one of those signs you see on improbably wide highways in America's mid-west, but this particular Hinton Hollow is a small town in Berkshire, England. Detective Sergeant Pace grew up here, until something happened and he ran away to the city. He's running away again…only this time evil is following him and is going to touch just about everyone in town. Full Review

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Review of

One Perfect Morning by Pamela Crane

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A husband is about to have his throat cut in his own bed. To find out who - and why - we need to go back nine days and twenty years.

Mackenzie, Robin and Lily met when they all went to the same college in Monroeville, Pennsylvania and twenty years later they're still the best of friends. When they first met they called themselves the Spicier Girls as a nod to the famous girl band of the day. Lily would be Adventure Spice, Robin the Homemaker and Mackenzie - well, Mackenzie would be the supporting actress in her own life. She married Owen, her college sweetheart and they have a daughter, Aria, who's now fifteen-year-old. Full Review

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Review of

The Wicked Sister by Karen Dionne

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When we first meet Rachel Cunningham she's an inpatient at the Newberry Regional Mental Health Center in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. She's twenty-six and has been there for fifteen years, convinced that she accidentally killed her mother when she was eleven-years-old and that her father then took the gun and killed himself. Her sister, Diana, just twenty-years-old, was left at the family home, a lodge in the Upper Peninsula wilderness. Rachel's very bright and although she's a voluntary patient at the Mental Health Center she remains there, feeling that this is what she deserves. Perhaps, though, the circumstances are not as she remembers. Full Review

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Review of

Truth Be Told by Kia Abdullah

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The Hadids are an effortful family. Flowers are sent for the slightest problem or achievement: letters are sent to thank and this prompts a phone call in return. There are two sons of the family, seventeen-year-old Kamran and sixteen-year-old Adam. Their mother, Sofia, regrets that she didn't name them the other way round: 'Adam and Kamran' trips off the tongue so much more easily than 'Kamran and Adam'. Sofia worries about that sort of thing. Both boys go to the prestigious Hampton school, where they board, despite the school being less than ten miles from their Belsize Park home. Kamran has a place at Oxford next year and all seemed to be going well until the night when he was raped. Full Review

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Review of

The Seven Doors by Agnes Ravatn and Rosie Hedger (translator)

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Come here for a thriller that interestingly doesn't even try to suggest a genre of any kind until we're a full fifth of the way through. We start with our couple, she a literature lecturer, he big in medical provision and decisions at the council, being forced to move out of their home, a building that had existed throughout her life since childhood and which they'd occupied for over thirty years. The building he's inherited, meanwhile, and which they let out to a single mother, is needed by their adult daughter, who quite blatantly says to its occupant 'take a hike, I'm moving in and you're moving out'. Now, at this stage you may well, if you know this is a genre read, think it's going to be a throwback to those 'home invasion' thrillers Hollywood gave us in the 1980s, but no. We avoid genre completely, as I say – instead learning about Greek tragedy, in case that has any bearing on what happens here, and seeing how an older-middle aged couple live their lives. Until at that twenty per cent stage we find something that raises an eyebrow as any crime book should – until the point where the evicted tenant is found to have completely vanished. Full Review

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Review of

House of Correction by Nicci French

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When we first meet Tabitha Hardy, she's in prison, on remand. She's sharing a cell with Michaela, who's more caring than she first appears. She delivers tough love and gets Tabitha eating and drinking - and encourages her to have a shower, unpleasant as the whole processes might be. And how did Tabitha get here? Well, on 21 December the body of Stuart Robert Rees was discovered in her garden shed by Andrew Kane, who was helping with the renovations to Tabitha's house. So far as the police are concerned, Tabitha is the only person who could have killed Rees - and when they arrived at her house she was covered in his blood. Full Review

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