Claire is coming to terms with widowhood and supporting her best friend Vic as she escapes an abusive husband. She is totally unprepared for the discovery that her late husband has a secret child…
The Couple Across The Street starts as an emotional rollercoaster and then progresses into a murder mystery as well. I have reviewed other books by Anita Waller including One Hot Summer and The Family at No 12.
Claire and Vic have always supported each other. Claire is left reeling from the news that her husband has a secret child at the same time that their own child died. She feels utterly betrayed and doesn’t know what to do next. Meanwhile she is supporting her best friend who lives across the road. Vic has left Rob and he isn’t happy about it. Vic and Claire wait until he is out and head over there to remove Vic’s belongings but find Rob’s murdered body instead.
I liked the big change in direction as the murder plot is introduced. The twists are delivered at quite a fast pace and I was eager to keep reading to find out how the two strands would resolve. Most of the book is written in the present day but we also see scenes from the recent past involving Jed as he searches for the truth about his parents. There were descriptions of events from last year concerning the Queen’s funeral and I felt that this grounded the story by adding to the realism.
The Couple Across The Street is relevant due to the modern detail and intriguing due to the host of lies which need to be unpicked as the plot progresses.
The Couple Across The Street
A darkness settles on this supposedly quiet street…
When Clare becomes a widow, her response is something that shocks her – relief. All she wants to do is move on and figure out how to continue her life, alone, no matter the guilt that brings.
So when Vic, her closest friend, comes to her, showing the signs of trouble in her own marriage, she is more than supportive in helping her leave Rob.
But Vic doesn’t get the chance to do that. Because as they go over to Vic’s house to collect her things, they find a body. Rob’s.
It appears someone else had an axe to grind. But for Clare, already reeling from secrets from her own late husband’s dark past, she’s about to find out this murder isn’t as straightforward as it may appear…
Author Bio –
Anita Waller is the author of many bestselling psychological thrillers and the Kat and Mouse crime series. She lives in Sheffield, which continues to be the setting of many of her thrillers. She was first published by Bloodhound at the age of sixty-nine. Her first book for Boldwood will be published in August 2022.
Social Media Links –
Jade Collins is on death row awaiting execution. CIA agent Mark Brand offers her a chance to escape in exchange for using her deadly skills to take out a drugs boss. Can the pair trust each other when their lives depend on it…?
The Woman From Death Row is a tense spy and crime thriller set in America.
Jade killed an abusive man and is utterly unrepentant. She has killed before and the victims always deserved it. She faces her execution with the same cool detachment but is offered a deal. The CIA want her to kill for them and they will fake her death and set her free. Jade accepts the deal but not everything goes smoothly.
The book is written from Jade and Mark’s perspectives. I really liked both main characters as they are complex, brave and determined. However, neither of them is entirely trustworthy yet they need to rely on each other in order to survive. Both of them have suffered which creates an emotional link between them and the reader as we want them to overcome their pain and succeed in their mission.
The plot twists are fast and furious and it was difficult to know whether Mark or Jade could be trusted or where the plot was heading. I don’t want to give big spoilers but there is plenty of double dealing and massive danger to both main characters. Some of the medical detail is a little grisly but I found it fascinating. This looks to be the first book in a new series and I would definitely want to follow Jade’s story.
The Woman From Death Row is an entertaining, fast paced and tense thriller.
Jade Collins grew up on the seedy side of Los Angeles, but her tenacious nature pushes her to strive for a better life. After attending college and earning her medical degree, she feels good about where her life is going. But, bad things happen to good people, and Jade finds herself on death row after killing a man who had been abusing one of her patients.
Just three years after his marriage, Dr. Mark Brand’s wife passes away and his life is sent into a downward spiral. Depression steals everything from him—his medical license, his livelihood and his will to go on. Only a reunion with a powerful man he once knew gives Mark the strength to pick himself up again. He has a new job and a new life, but he is paying a steep price for his second chance. Nothing in life is free and this powerful man has plans for Mark.
Mark is sent to San Quentin to meet Jade and offers to get her off death row if she agrees to team up with him in a dangerous assignment. With no other choice, Jade agrees but aims to get out of the game at the first opportunity. Mark wants out too, but he’s sold his soul to the man who rescued him, and his only option is to follow orders and get the job done.
As danger mounts, Mark is pitted against the man who saved him and he’s forced to rely on Jade, a woman he hardly knows and doesn’t fully trust. The situation is made worse by the feelings he’s developing for her.
Will the opportunist destroy Mark’s life once more?
Will this game put Jade back on death row?
About the author
Peter Hogenkamp is a practicing physician, public speaker and author of medical fiction and thrillers living in Rutland, Vermont. Peter’s writing credits include The Intern (TouchPoint Press, April 2020); The Vatican Conspiracy book and audiobook (Bookouture/HachetteUK, October 2020), The Vatican Secret (Bookouture/HachetteUK, April 2021), The Vatican Secret audiobook (Saga Egmont, March 2022) and Cospirazione Vaticano (Newton Compton Editori 7/2021.) The Woman from Death Row, book one of the new Jade Stryker thriller series, will be published Spring 2023 by Tirgearr Publishing. Peter can be found on his Author Website, as well as his personal blog, Peter Hogenkamp Writes, where he writes about most anything. He is the creator, producer and host of Your Health Matters, a health information program, which airs on cable television and streams on YouTube. Peter was a finalist for the prestigious 2019 Killer Nashville Claymore Award as well as the 2020 Vermont Writer’s Prize. He tweets—against the wishes of his wife, four children and feisty Cairn Terrier, Hermione—on Twitter. He can be reached at his FaceBook Page and at peterhogenkampbooks@gmail.com.
TRIGGER WARNING: domestic abuse, child death, dementia
Catherine and her daughter run away from an abusive home one night. She reinvents herself as Cate and finds a job as a housekeeper for a reclusive fossil hunter Charles. But can she heal her daughter and her own heart?
The Way To The Sea is a gentle and warm book that deals with some big emotional issues.
Cate’s daughter Eliza is mute after witnessing her mother being abused. Cate has no choice but to abandon the family home and run away with Eliza. Her friend Allie helps her to find a job but she discovers that her new employer has his own heartache to deal with. His son died and his wife blamed him so left. Charles has been living alone with his guilt and grief but also the stress of his mother’s dementia. There is also a sub plot about Cate’s friend Allie and her worries about her son’s father coming back into their lives.
The emotional issues included in the book are pretty heavy but this is balanced by a lightness to the tone and style of writing. Cate, Eliza and Charles gently learn to connect with each other and begin to heal. I actually really liked the lack of sexual chemistry or any romantic development between Charles and Cate. Their respectful friendship felt very realistic.
I felt a huge connection with this book due to Matthew’s love of dinosaurs and our visit to Lyme Regis last year. There is plenty of detail about the different fossils that doesn’t bog down the story unnecessarily but has enough information for those of us with dino obsessed kids!
The Way To The Sea is a lovely heartwarming book.
The Way to the Sea
When Cate Rivers leaves her husband in the middle of the night with their young daughter, Eliza, she has no idea what the future holds. Taking a live-in position at Hollow House on the Dorset coast, she determines to make a new life for her and Eliza.
But Cate’s new boss, fossil hunter Charles Thorner, could do without the problems of a couple of runaways under his roof. He’s got enough worries of his own, including a painful past which still holds him prisoner today.
As the two of them learn to work alongside each other, secrets are shared and a new closeness is found, but they soon discover that you can only hide from the past for so long…
The Way to the Sea is the latest heartwarming novel by the bestselling author of The Beauty of Broken Things and The Rose Girls.
Author Bio
Victoria Connelly lives in a 500-year old thatched cottage in rural Suffolk with her artist husband, a springer spaniel and a flock of ex-battery hens. She is the million-selling author of two bestselling series, The Austen Addicts and The Book Lovers, as well as many other novels and novellas. Her first published novel, Flights of Angels, was made into a film in Germany. Victoria loves books, films, walking, historic buildings and animals. If she isn’t at her keyboard writing, she can usually be found in her garden either with a trowel in her hand or a hen on her lap.
Social Media Links –
Instagram: @victoriaconnellyauthor
Facebook: @victoriaconnellyauthor
TRIGGER WARNING: suicide, child murder, domestic abuse
Sally has left the police force but she can never forget the missing girls. She is still in contact with the families and mourns their loss. But out of the blue she is contacted by the chief suspect who claims to have information. Then she sees a missing poster with her own photo on, the same format as the killer used to use. Can she trust a convict, will she ever find the truth, is she in danger?
Next Girl Missing is a crime thriller novel set in America.
Sally is haunted by a case of missing girls which ended after the last girl was found raped and murdered. The other bodies were never found. Now the main suspect in the case promises to reveal the real killer but only to Sally. The police and Sally lock horns over the correct course of action and in the meantime she realises that she might be the killer’s next target.
The book is written from various third person perspectives and from different times. This allows us to see the background to the case but also Sally’s personal life which plays a significant role in the book. Her current situation as a single parent and her relationship with her son has its roots in the past and her marriage to Scott, a fellow officer. Scott was horrendously controlling and the scenes of his emotional abuse felt uncomfortably authentic. Now she has a fresh start out of the police and her marriage but the case still affects her deeply.
The author has carefully balanced the serial killer case with introducing us to Sally. There are plenty of plot twists, tension and mystery about the case as well as the emotional depth to Sally’s personal life.
Next Girl Missing is an engaging start to a series and the next book Her Deadly Truth is also available now.
Book blurb:
Next Girl Missing: A completely addictive and gripping crime thriller with a shocking twist (A Sally Fairburn Crime Thriller Book 1)
The little girl fidgets in her seat, wringing the ends of her scarf in a rush of panic. She tugs at the car door handle but it doesn’t open. Tears well in her eyes. “I want my mommy.”
Four years ago, six young girls were snatched from the streets of quiet, suburban Pioneer Heights—chilling, fake “missing” posters of each victim hung around town just before they were taken. Ex-police officer Sally Fairburn has always been haunted by the case and their inability to bring the girls home. Having lost her own daughter, she knows only too well the pain it brings…
Four years on, the wide brown eyes and neat braids of twelve-year-old Anna Moorhouse—the last girl to disappear—still plague Sally’s dreams. She has never stopped fighting to bring the devastated families back together, but all leads have gone cold. Until Sally receives a chilling call out of the blue: their former main suspect, in prison for another crime, wants to talk to her… alone.
Desperate for answers, Sally races to interview him. But a horrifying discovery stops her in her tracks: a missing poster—on her daily running route, in the same style used four years ago—with Sally’s own face on it…
Not only is Sally in grave danger, but the more threats she receives, the more convinced she becomes that the killer is a lot closer to home than she ever could have imagined… But can Sally finally catch him before any more innocents disappear—and before Sally herself becomes his next victim…?
Fans of Lisa Regan, Greg Olsen and Melinda Leigh will love this gripping new crime thriller series. Prepare to stay up all night!
Her Deadly Truth: An addictive and completely unputdownable crime thriller filled with nail-biting suspense (A Sally Fairburn Crime Thriller Book 2)
She stumbles into the street in a thin cotton nightdress, tripping in her haste to get away from her house. Her feet are bare, her movements frantic. “I have to get out of here,” she pleads. “He’s killing me.”
For weeks, Carolyn Tate’s suspicions that her husband is trying to kill her have been ignored—by her neighbors, her friends and even her family. But just two hours after her last attempt to make someone listen, her body is discovered.
Carolyn’s neighbor, ex-police officer Sally Fairburn, is determined to seek justice for her friend’s death. But although Carolyn suspected her husband, Sally finds no evidence he was involved. And Carolyn’s best friends are strangely quick to defend him…
Sally knows one of Carolyn’s friends, Lauren, is hiding something. She can see it in her tear-stained cheeks, averted eyes and tense shoulders: Fear. But just as Lauren’s finally ready to come clean, she is murdered in a brutal hit and run. Reeling from Lauren’s death, Sally is horrified to receive a series of dropped calls and anonymous flowers, leaving her with the unsettled feeling that she, too, is being followed…
Then, on edge but feeling closer than ever to the truth, Sally watches a stranger threaten her teenage son—a finger drawn across his throat. Her world stops. It’s not just Sally at risk—everyone she loves is in danger unless she finds the truth… Can Sally stop a brutal killer before more innocent lives are lost?
A gripping, addictive crime thriller, perfect for fans of Lisa Regan, Greg Olsen and Melinda Leigh. Be prepared to sleep with the light on…
About L.A. Larkin
L.A. Larkin’s crime and psychological thrillers have won her fans all over the world. Described as a superb “chiller thriller” writer by Marie Claire magazine, and praised by the king of crime, Lee Child, for her “fast and immersive” thrillers, Louisa’s novels will keep you reading all night.
Her new Sally Fairburn series kicks off with Next Girl Missing (book 1) and Her Deadly Truth (book 2), available from all online bookstores from June 16, 2023.
Author social media
Amber Dennis is a high powered lawyer with plenty of potential enemies. She begins to receive threatening emails which she ignores until her car is trashed and her phone is stolen. Her life is also endangered so she begins to take the threats seriously…
The Couple Next Door is a psychological thriller set in LA. I have previously reviewed The Perfect Suitor by Cole Baxter.
Amber is utterly ruthless and not a nice person. It was so difficult to like her despite the terrible things that start to happen to her. Her confidence is severely shaken when she starts to endure a hate campaign against her. But the list of potential culprits is pretty long as she makes enemies so easily.
The book is written from Amber’s first person perspctive but even this fails to endear her to the reader as we see her machinations, unpleasant thoughts and less than scrupulous behaviour in her personal and professional lives. In some ways I admire Amber’s ambition and she works within the law, but her moral decisions are difficult to excuse.
The writing is fast paced and there are plenty of dramatic incidents as the campaign against Amber escalates. I enjoyed the mystery of trying to work out who was responsible and their motive. My only gripe is the title doesn’t seem to fit the book particularly well.
The Couple Next Door is an entertaining thriller and I liked the unlikeability of the main character.
Book Blurb
A hotshot lawyer with the world at her feet. A stranger determined to destroy her.
Hotshot defense lawyer Amber Dennis has it all. She’s a successful attorney and the proud owner of a luxurious new condo, an expensive car, and a fat bank account. Not to mention a blossoming relationship with the gorgeous David Grant.
Amber’s perfect life is shattered when she starts receiving threatening emails. At first, she brushes them off. After all, she can’t help but make a few enemies in her line of work.
But when the threats become more real, she can no longer ignore them. Someone out there wants to destroy her. Who could it be, and why are they targeting her?
As her world implodes, Amber decides she’s not going down without a fight. She’s determined to find out who is threatening her and why.
What she doesn’t realise is her stalker is a lot closer than she thinks. And convinced that Amber has wronged them terribly, they’ll stop at nothing to make her pay the ultimate price.
The Couple Next Door is a nail-biting psychological thriller that packs a powerful punch.
Author Bio
Cole Baxter loves writing psychological suspense thrillers. It’s all about that last reveal that he loves shocking readers with.
He grew up in New York, where there crime was all around. He decided to turn that into something positive with his fiction.
His stories will have you reading through the night—they are very addictive!
Cole’s Links:
