From the publisher: It’s the party to end all parties…but not everyone is here to celebrate. On New Year’s Eve, Rhys Lloyd has a house full of guests. His vacation homes on Mirror Lake are a success, and he’s generously invited the village to drink champagne with their wealthy new neighbors. But by midnight, Rhys will be floating dead in the freezing waters of the lake. On New Year’s Day, Ffion Morgan has a village full of suspects. The tiny community is her home, so the suspects are her neighbors, friends and family—and Ffion has her own secrets to protect. With a lie uncovered at every turn, soon the question isn’t who wanted Rhys dead…but who finally killed him. In a village with this many secrets, murder is just the beginning.
Police Procedural
Book Review | Hidden Pieces by Mary Keliikoa
From the publisher: Sheriff Jax Turner is staring down the barrel of his broken past. On the brink of ending it all, he feels like a failure following his daughter’s tragic passing and his subsequent divorce. But when a schoolgirl vanishes and her backpack is found in a sex offender’s backseat, the weary lawman drags himself into action and vows to nail one last sociopath. Can the jaded sheriff take down the culprit in time to bring the young girl home alive?
Book Review | Dark Objects — Simon Toyne
From the publisher: Laughton Rees is an academic who doesn’t usually work live cases after the brutal murder of her mother as a teen left her traumatized and emotionally scarred. But the presence of her book at a murder scene draws her unwillingly into the high-profile investigation and media circus that springs up around it.
Book Review | The Killing Kind by Jane Casey
From the publisher: As a barrister, Ingrid Lewis is used to dealing with tricky clients, but no one has ever come close to John Webster. After Ingrid defended Webster against a stalking charge, he then turned on her — following her, ruining her relationship, even destroying her home. Now, Ingrid believes she has finally escaped his clutches. But when one of her colleagues is run down on a busy London road, Ingrid is sure she was the intended victim. And then Webster shows up at her door. Webster claims Ingrid is in danger — and that only he can protect her.
Jane Casey writes a police procedural series about a detective named Maeve Kerrigan that I love. I was disappointed when I found out that Casey’s new book would be a standalone…
Book Review | China Roses by Jo Bannister
From the publisher: No one ever said: “See Norbold and die.” So why would a man from DC Hazel Best’s past cross England in order to get himself beaten senseless in this uninspiring Midlands town? Everyone assumes he was looking for Hazel. She can’t think why he would; and when David Sperrin wakes up, he can’t think why he would either. Amnesia — or something to hide? Flashbacks as Sperrin’s battered brain recovers only make the case more troubling. His sharpest memory is of a girl dying in his arms. But who, and how? Struggling to make sense of the situation, Hazel turns to her close friend Gabriel Ash for help. But Ash has problems of his own: one of his own ghosts has returned to haunt him. And the stakes are so high there’s no one, not even Hazel, he can confide in…