>

Sunday, 25 February 2024

Lethal Vengeance (Detective Erica Foster #8) by Robert Bryndza


Description from Goodreads:

"The man lay on his front, his arms and legs bound and pulled up with a rope connecting the two. His head was arched back, so he faced the curtains, and there was masking tape over his mouth. Erika gingerly reached out and checked his pulse.

Yep. Dead all right.

When Detective Erika Foster finds politician Neville Lomas naked, hog-tied, and dead in his own bed, skittish higher-ups at the Met quickly rule the death from natural causes. Case closed . . . until two months later when a well-known casting director and a star footballer are found murdered and tied with the same knots. The Met can no longer ignore what’s staring them in the face: there’s a serial killer loose in London, and they’re out to settle a score.

As Erika and her team investigate, things take a strange turn as CCTV footage turns up five female suspects . . . and they’re all identical.

In the hunt to identify the women, Erika is outpaced at every turn by an elusive sex worker with dirt on enough powerful men to make the Met’s top brass nervous – and desperate.

As time ticks away until the killer strikes again, it’s up to Erika to untangle the web of evidence and answer the critical questions: What ties the victims together, who else is caught up in this scandal, and how far are the higher-ups willing to go to protect their own?"

📚📚📚📚📚📚

Once again, this is a peach of a book from an author that I am most definitely a fan of.

This might be the eighth in this series but don't let that put you off; it reads well as a standalone and whilst you have missed some of the character development, Mr Bryndza's writing is so good that it's not really an issue.

The characters are really strong, the plot riveting and the pace is perfect.  Who is killing high profile men and leaving them in uncompromising poses with the only evidence being a polaroid photograph with the name "Annabelle" written on the back ... who is Annabelle, how can she be stopped before she strikes again and who is going to be next?

This is a gripping and tense read for fans of police procedurals, serial killer stories and crime thrillers and one that I can highly recommend along with the rest of Robert Bryndza's work.

Many thanks to the author, Raven Street Publishing and NetGalley for enabling me to read and share my thoughts of Lethal Vengeance.

👇👇👇👇👇👇

Connect with the author:


👀👀👀👀👀👀

Other books by Robert Bryndza I have read and reviewed
Check them out:


 

Sunday, 4 February 2024

The Social Cull by Steven Jenkins


Description from the author:

"Twenty-nine-year-old Lana is a social-media fanatic and climate-change activist, born into a world where criminals are executed to reduce the population. The majority of citizens—Lana included—are content with the system, but overcrowding is still a problem.

Faced with intolerable pollution levels, the government secretly uses social media to assess whether or not a user must face execution. The plan gets leaked, and a cull list is released to the public.

Lana is on the list. 

Forced into a life on the run, she takes refuge in a remote lake house with her boyfriend. In her new world of paranoia and isolation, Lana must learn to survive without safety, family, and technology to evade the cull.

Without a keyboard to hide behind, Lana is compelled to re-examine how well she knows herself and how she wound up a fugitive in the first place—and the answers might hit painfully close to home. "

📚📚📚📚📚📚

I have read a few of Steven Jenkins' books before as I like to partake in a little escapism to the dark side every now and again and I have to say that I quite enjoyed this.

The "Social Cull" is based on a short story called "The Cull" which appeared in "Little Horrors Vol. 1".  It is a story of the lengths the world will go to to save the planet due to climate change and how people's behaviour, particularly on social media, comes back to bite them in the behind and whilst I don't condone the actions of the government in this book, I do wish there were consequences for trolls and generally nasty people who post unnecessary hate online.

A very thought-provoking book that had me thinking and I must thank the author for enabling me to read and share my thoughts of this disturbing and thought-provoking book.

👇👇👇👇👇👇

Connect with the author:


👀👀👀👀👀👀

Read my reviews of other books by Steven Jenkins:

Little Horrors Vol. 1

The Murder After the Night Before by Katy Brent


 Description from Goodreads:

"Something terrible happened last night.

My best friend Posey is dead. The police think it was a tragic accident, but something doesn’t feel right. Posey was keeping secrets, and I owe it to her to find out what happened.

But I can’t remember a thing… 

I’ve woken up with a hangover from hell, a stranger in my bed, and, to add to all this chaos, I’ve gone viral for all the wrong reasons. But that won’t stop me from getting to the truth..."

📚📚📚📚📚📚

I listened to the audiobook of Katy Brent's debut book "How To Kill Men and Get Away With It" and I absolutely loved it so wasn't going to turn down the opportunity to read this now was I?  I am so glad I didn't, because this is another cracker.

This is a gripping, dark and entertaining book that is certainly of our time which deals with some difficult subjects with honesty and humour.  The main character of Molly is excellent and very relatable; her plight in this book would send anyone screaming into the wilderness but she is determined to find out what happened to her best friend and we are taken along for the ride.

The story is relevant, up to date and frighteningly plausible which moves along at a really good pace.  There are twists and turns which kept me reading way into the night so desperate was I to find out how it was all going to end and I wasn't disappointed.

This book will have you going through all manner of feelings and emotions and I highly recommend it and must thank the author, HQ, HQ Digital and NetGalley for enabling me to read and share my thoughts of this excellent book.

👀👀👀👀👀👀

Read my review of the audiobook of Katy Brent's debut comedy thriller: