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Found by Erin Kinsley - Review and Blog Tour Today I have the pleasure of being part of another fabulous Random Things Blog Tour. A BBC Radio 2 book club choice, there is plenty to talk about in Found and I hope my thoughts on this twisty new psychological thriller help you decide whether to read it. #Found has just been published by @headlinepg and you can grab a copy right now. My Review Found is the story of every parents’ nightmare – imagine if your child went missing – wouldn’t that be … …the WORST thing that could EVER happen?  Well, it’s happened to Matt and Claire. Their 11 year old son Evan disappears without trace after setting off for a bus, he doesn’t come home from school and the family’s nightmare scenario begins and the reader is about to be with them all the way, experiencing their grief, frustration and anger at a system which leaves the police so overworked that it seems they haven’t the resources to find one small boy.  We watch Mum and Dad’s lives fall apar...

Call Me Star Girl Louise Beech This week sees the launch of a new title by Louise Beech whose previous books have been fab and this one is too. I'm delighted to be part of the blog tour for this super thriller and my review follows. My Review: Call me Star Girl is a slightly new direction for Author Louise Beech whose wonderful books are full of heart and emotional punch. Star Girl is not lacking in these elements but it is much more of a psychological who-dunnit thriller. Stella McKeever is the Star Girl of the title, even her name Stella means star and stars have played a big part in her life, from the star emblazoned vintage perfume bottle she has carried around all her life as a memento of her Mother who left 12 years ago when Stella was a child, to her job as a radio presenter and it's even her nickname used by her boyfriend Tom. Most of the book takes place one evening at the radio station where Stella works. She is presenting her very last programme as she prepares to le...

My Review of The Perfect Friend by Barbara Copperthwaite : It's just what we all want isn't it? The Perfect Friend? Barbara Copperthwaite has excelled herself, yet again, with this terrific, tense and terrifying, twisty thriller. My goodness, I just can't imagine how she manages to dream up characters capable of such dastardly deeds. Just when I think she can't possibly get any better, my favourite writer of dark and daring deeds blows my socks off. The Perfect Friend, scared me so much I really don't think I'll ever dare trust anyone, ever again! On the surface it's a novel about friendship, surviving and learning to live with your own failures. Beneath its a seething maelstrom of lies, deceit and corruption that made my head reel. The perfect Friend introduces us to two lovely ladies who become friends through a support group which helps people who are finding it difficult to cope with what life has thrown at them. Both are damaged and traumatised. Despite...

My Review Oh My Goodness! This book packs a powerful punch that smacked me in the gut, there's a real shocker of a twist that I really didn't anticipate until just a chapter or two before it is to be revealed I began to have a nauseous sense that there was something coming that I hadn't been expecting .... then wham! But I digress, it's hardly surprising that my thoughts are a little muddled having just spent several days locked in the mind of a woman incarcerated in a lunatic asylum. This woman is Edith Potter, daughter of the renowned Dr Potter leader in the field of examining the psychological impact of shell shock following the first world war. Spinster Edith lives alone, since her father was murdered by an unknown intruder, no wonder she is jumpy and nervous living in the very house where he was killed. It's clear from the onset that Ediths mind is a little disturbed, she has secrets and has built a wall to keep them away, but this is to become her undoing and ...

My review of Bring Me Back by B A Paris This is a very twisty and twisted, psychological thriller. If you love to be puzzled by cryptic clues and teeny hints that might not all be what they seem this is a must read book for you. Narrated mostly by Finn, the main male protagonist who is engaged to be married to Emma. He used to be passionately in love with Emmas sister Layla who mysteriously disappeared 12 years ago, when the couple were on their way back from a holiday and has never been seen since. But suddenly messages begin to appear which would seem to indicate that Layla is back, or soon plans to be back in Finn's life. He gets very confused and terribly frustrated and begins to find clues everywhere which disturb and worry him, many of these clues are deliberately placed tiny Russian dolls, which show up at every turn. They have a particular significance to Finn and Layla. He finds on on the garden wall and one on his plate when he goes to the pub ( a pub which is owned and r...

The Visitors by Catherine Burns my Review A creepy and unsettling dark and twisty thriller that send shudders up my spine .... You know that big old house at the end of your street, the old one a bit run down but thats been quite grand at some point. The residents seem quiet and unassuming, a little odd but they keep themselves to themselves so they don't bother anyone - Well, they might be Marian and her brother, John. Oh I do hope not! I certainly felt the location was familiar, an unspecified Northern seaside town (which I pictured in my mind as Redcar) This deliciously dark and inventive tale is a slow burner, dark and sinister with a sense of creeping menace and building tension and the odd prickle at the back of your neck when you're reading it. It is narrated by Marian and right from the start it's obvious she is damaged goods. A middle aged woman who lives with her brother, has few relationships and some very strange habits. She sleeps with a whole bunch of teddy be...

Her Last Secret by Barbara Copperthwaite: Having read, loved and reviewed all of Barbara Copperthwaites previous books I was delighted to accept an invitation to take part in the blog blitz to launch her latest twisty psychological thriller - Her last Secret. If you like convoluted, dark and twisty domestic Noir grip-lit you'll adore this new title. My Review Her last Secret begins at the end and then takes you back in the past to find out who and when and why the terrible event that grabs you and shakes you right at the start, happened. Its set at Christmas so it's topical for this time of year, but this is no glitter and tinsel fairytale. Its the story of a dysfunctional family and their individual flaws and failings, and boy there are loads! Every member of the Thomas family has dark and deep secrets and every one of them is angry and desperate but are any of them desperate enough to commit the atrocity which is being investigated? You bet they are! But which member or frien...

Today I'm part of the #blogtour for the newly released debut novel by Caroline England entitled Beneath the skin. Beneath the Skin is a stunning debut psychological Domestic Noir drama about a life-changing lie. Caroline England’s,  Beneath The Skin  is a tense and compelling read, exploring truth, friendships and betrayal. Description: No-one remembers your past. But you do. ‘Antonia, Antonia. My name is Antonia.’ It’s been her name for many years. But sometimes, like tonight, she forgets. Antonia has a secret. A secret so dark and so deep that she can barely admit it to herself. Instead, she treats herself to Friday night sessions of self-harm while her husband David is at the pub, and her best friend Sophie is drinking too much wine a few doors down. Nobody close to her knows the truth about what the teenage Antonia saw all those years ago. No-one, that is, except her mother. But Candy is in a care home now, her mind too addled to remember the truth. Antonia is safe. Isn’t ...

#FriendRequest - Laura Marshall @laurajm8 #Bookreview My Review: Friend Request is a term most of us will take for granted, you use Social Media you connect with people you know and sometmes you get a friend request from someone you haven't seen in a while. It's happened to me .... Usually it's a pleasant surprise .... But not for single Mum Louise Williams it isn't! The friend request she receives is a bit of a shock - it's from her old classmate Maria Weston. She hasn't heard a thing from Maria since leaving school, unsurprisingly, because Maria died, 25 years ago, didn't she? Louise can't resist having a little peek at her profile though, because Maria has never strayed very far from Louise's thoughts. Not when she was married to Sam who subsequently left her for another woman, even throughout her struggle to conceive her only child Henry, now 4 years old and the centre of Louise's universe, Maria was there in her deepest thoughts and fears. B...

Lost in the Lake – A J Waines - review and Blog Tour It’s great to be part of the blog tour for this new title, the second book in the Samantha Willerby series of psychological thrillers. For readers who have read the first in the series “Inside the Whispers” this will be a welcome return to the life of Dr Samantha Willerby, an engaging and professional clinical psychologist. If you haven’t yet read that you can read my review here although it will make great reading as a stand-alone I highly recommend reading them in order. My Review The story begins when Dr Sam Willerby meets her new client Rosie Chandler, who seeks out Samantha to help her remember the events surrounding an accident she was involved in where the vehicle she was travelling in plummeted into a lake. Narrowly escaping with her life has left Rosie, a Viola player in a quartet shaken, traumatised and with amnesia about the accident. Sam has the skills and experience to help Rosie piece together the missing memories and ...

Today I am delighted to announce the cover reveal for the forthcoming new novel by one of my favourite Authors A J Waines: AJ Waines has sold over 400,000 books worldwide and topped the UK and Australian Kindle Charts in 2015 & 2016 with her number one bestseller, Girl on a Train . Following fifteen years as a psychotherapist, she is now a full-time novelist with publishing deals in France, Germany, Norway, Hungary and USA (audiobooks). Her fourth psychological thriller, No Longer Safe , sold over 30,000 copies in the first month, in thirteen countries. AJ Waines has been featured in The Wall Street Journal and The Times and was ranked a Top 10 UK author on Amazon KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) in 2016. She lives in Hampshire, UK, with her husband. Visit her website and blog , or join her on Twitter , Facebook or on her Newsletter .   Here's the blurb for her new thriller: Lost in the lake, I am really looking forward to getting stuck into it, having met Sam Willerby in In...

Review - the Upstairs Room - Kate Murray-Browne A macabre, chilling and unsettling debut novel, The Upstairs Room is a contemporary take on the classic "young couple move into a new home that turns out to have something sinister lurking upstairs". Eleanor and husband Richard have found their new family home for themselves and their 2 young daughters. They know it will be a struggle financially to buy in a desirable area of London so they settle for an older property that "needs a bit doing" well frankly it needs quite a lot of renovation and redecoration but they're young and enthusiastic and it can be a project for them to enjoy together. Bit it becomes more of a money pit than they imagined, and in order to keep their heads above water they rather reluctantly sub-let the basement to a young woman lodger and into the periphery of their lives comes Zoe. However living in this gloomy and outdated home soon makes Eleanor in particular begin to feel distinctly une...

My review of He Said, She Said by Erin Kelly Wow - wonderful twisty read, blew my socks off.  It's not often that I finish a book and can't really find words to write a review straight away. But I loved this book so much I had to take a step back and examine what I thought or just babble away senselessly.  Its delightfully different and darkly convoluted. It actually took me a little while to get into it at the beginning as it's deliberately written in several voices from different viewpoints and jumps back and forth several years and it does take a while to get into the rhythm, but when you do boy does it grab you and just won't let go! We begin our tortuous journey by being introduced to a young couple, Laura who is pregnant and her partner Kit who is heading off across the seas to witness an eclipse. For that is what this young couple do as a hobby, they are eclipse chasers and travel all over the world joing festivals and celebrations and watching eclipses. They...

BLOG TOUR - The Lucky Ones by Mark Edwards I'm thrilled to kick start the blog tour for this brilliant book with my review. I'm fairly certain that if I start my review by saying Mark Edwards has a truly warped mind, he would take this as the huge compliment it is intended to be! How he dreamt up this twisty thriller I can't imagine. He gets deep inside the malformed psyche of a devilish serial killer to take the reader on a vivid and skin crawling journey of terror. Let me briefly introduce you to the authors work, whose page you can find here . He writes brilliantly different and terrifyingly unorthodox psychological thrillers, which have included Because She loves me , Follow you home and The Devils work . You can follow the links to read each of my reviews of his previous work and you just might come away with the idea that I'm already a big fan of this talented writer and you wouldn't be far wrong. So its always with a sense of worried anticipation that I open...