REVIEW | Serenity

Series: the Shelby Alexander Thriller #1
Author: Craig A. Hart
Genre: adult, mystery, thriller
Published: October 14, 2016
Purchase: Amazon

Do You Love Thrillers? The New Shelby Alexander Thriller Series Is Here! Don't Forget To Breathe... 

A woman dies in his arms...a drug dealer offers him $10,000...a gunman is determined to kill him. And then everything goes to hell. 

Shelby Alexander is an aging ex-boxer and retired fixer, whose activities often flirted with the wrong side of the law. Looking for a little peace and a slower pace of life, he moved to Serenity, the small Michigan town where he grew up. But trouble follows men like Shelby, and he finds himself embroiled in an underworld of drugs and violence that may prove to be his undoing. The first book in the new Shelby Alexander Thriller Series, Serenity is an action-packed read with a lovingly rendered cast, witty dialogue, and a main character who doesn't know when to quit. 

If You Love These Authors, You'll Love the Shelby Alexander Series: Nick Stephenson Mark Dawson David Archer John Hemmings Christopher Greyson 

REVIEW | At Risk

Series: N/A
Author: S.G. Redling
Genre: adult, mystery, thriller
Publish: September 20, 2016
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Colleen McElroy grew up wealthy and pampered, the daughter of a prominent society family in Lexington, Kentucky. But her privileged upbringing could not prepare or protect her from her cruel and abusive first husband. Although her calamitous marriage left her with physical and emotional scars that have yet to heal, they haven’t prevented her from doing her best to rebuild her life. 

Charismatic Patrick McElroy has scars of his own from his traumatic childhood in the foster care system, but with his business partner, John, he has built a celebrated, state-of-the-art home for at-risk youths. When one goes missing, Colleen is plunged into a nightmare of uncertainty about the girl’s disappearance. Is she paranoid, seeing disasters where there is just bad luck, or does an unspeakable evil lurk behind the new life she’s made for herself? No longer sure of whom she can trust, Colleen will have to rely on herself to discover the truth. 

REVIEW | Forbidden Birth

Series: Chris Ravello #1
Author: William Rubin
Genre: adult, mystery, thriller
Publish: August 30, 2016
Purchase: Amazon | Kobo

“Deep breaths filled my lungs as I purged the anxiety and fear that clawed at me from within. Who was the serial killer… and why were our vics all missing the same body part?” 

Doctor Christopher Ravello is driven by an unquenchable desire to avenge his mother’s senseless murder. He forsakes a lucrative career in medicine, and plunges headlong into the brutal, unforgiving world of a New York City homicide detective. Head of the new Division of Medical Crimes, Ravello’s first case pits him against a brilliant, sadistic serial killer. Known only as The Giver, he is hell bent on subjecting young women and their unborn babies to his illicit experiments. As the body count rises, New York City is engulfed in fear. Fighting an illness which threatens his job, immersed in turmoil at home due to his radical career change, Ravello struggles to understand who The Giver is and where he will strike next. Just as he discovers the killer’s identity the unspeakable happens, and Ravello is confronted with an agonizing choice: will he play it safe or make the ultimate sacrifice to save his loved ones and the city he is sworn to protect and serve?  

REVIEW | Savage Reckoning

Series: Backwoods Justice #1
Author: C. Hoyt Caldwell
Genre: mystery, thriller
Publish: Octoer 4, 2016
Publisher: Alibi
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | iBooks | Kobo

In the vein of Elmore Leonard’s Justified, C. Hoyt Caldwell introduces a thriller series set in the dark side of the Appalachian mountains—featuring a heroine who’s playing both sides of the law. 

Deputy Dani Savage would like nothing better than to shoot the wife beaters, carjackers, drug dealers, and all the rest of the low-life good ol’ boys that make policing Baptist Flats, Tennessee, near impossible. Instead, she grits her teeth and serves the God-fearing townsfolk without complaint. The “little deputy,” as she’s known, is often overlooked and ridiculed for being a small-statured woman in a big man’s world. But while investigating a cold case involving a missing teen, Dani stumbles onto some disturbing facts that cannot be ignored. 

Soon Dani realizes that this case goes back decades. There’s a history of young women being stolen from the Tennessee hills, and a legacy of corrupt cops looking the other way. Dani’s investigation leads her to the “closeout kings,” a pair of hired killers with a tale to tell—a tale of a missing girl and a crime worse than murder. Somehow these two deranged hit men are Dani’s last, best allies. They know that it’s time for payback—and in the backwoods, justice takes only one form.

REVIEW | Mortom

Series: N/A
Author: Erik Therme
Genre: adult, mystery, thriller
Publish: April 28, 2015
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Andy Crowl barely knew his recently deceased cousin, Craig Moore, so he’s especially surprised to be named as the sole beneficiary in Craig’s will. Not that there’s much to inherit: just an empty bank account and a run-down house. 

Once Andy arrives in the town of Mortom, however, he’s drawn into his puzzle-obsessed cousin’s true legacy: a twisted and ominous treasure hunt. Beckoned by macabre clues of dead rats and cemetery keys, Andy jumps into the game, hoping to discover untold wealth. But unsavory secrets—and unanswered questions about Craig’s untimely demise—arise at every turn, leading Andy to wonder if he’s playing the game…or if the game is playing him. 

Something’s rotten in Mortom. And this dead man’s game might not be all that Andy is doomed to lose. 

REVIEW | Zero

Series: Zero #1
Author: Morgan Dark
Genre: young adult, contemporary, mystery, thriller, fantasy
Publish: June 28, 2016 (first published May 4, 2015)
Publisher: Rubiños 1860
Purchase: Amazon | B&N

A baffling robber. 

A mystery hidden for years. 

And an elite boarding school where no one is who they say they are. 

Kyle Bradford is the envy of Drayton College, but everything takes a turn when a dangerous shadow, hidden in the darkness, starts to stalk him. From then on, his life falls apart. Unjustly accused of being the main suspect behind the robberies terrifying high society, he is forced to prove his innocence. And to do so, he has to find the real culprit: Zero, an infallible criminal who keeps his identity hidden under a silver mask. What Kyle does not know is that his enemy is keeping a secret. A secret he would sacrifice everything for. 

A dizzying, heart-stopping thriller you won’t be able to put down.

BLOG TOUR | Caught Bread Handed

full tour schedule can be found at CBB Book Promotions

Series: A Bakeshop Mystery #4
Author: Ellie Alexander
Genre: adult, contemporary, mystery
Published: June 28, 2016
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository | Vintage Books

Welcome to Torte—a friendly, small-town family bake shop where the oven is heating up as high as the body count… 

Jules Capshaw is still chewing over her husband Carlos’s return to Ashland, Oregon. Could there be too many cooks in the kitchen? Whatever is stirring between those two will have to wait. Despite the Oregon Shakespeare Festival being dark for the winter, the bakeshop is bustling, the dough is rolling, and there’s no rest for the weary…especially when murder is thrown into the mix. 

When Mindy Nolan, the owner of a new restaurant in town, turns up dead, the batter at hand thickens. Jules knows that there was bad blood between Mindy and others in town, and tracking down the killer could prove to be an unwelcome treat. And to top it all off, there’s Carlos, who is pleading—with those delicious dark eyes and sexy Spanish accent—for Jules to take him back. Is home where the heart is or will she make a fresh start…and risk getting burned?

REVIEW | The Masterpiecers

Series: Masterful #1
Author: Olivia Wildenstein
Genre: young adult, contemporary, mystery, romance
Publish: April 15, 2016
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Nineteen-year-old Ivy Redd’s talent with a needle and thread has earned her a spot on a coveted reality TV art competition set in New York’s Metropolitan Museum. The prize: a significant amount of money and instant acceptance into the Masterpiecers, the school that ensures new artists fame and fortune. Her talent has also thrust her and her twin sister, Aster, into the spotlight.  

Not that Aster needed help with becoming a media favorite. She managed that on her own by running over a wanted mobster. She told the police it was self-defense, because she couldn’t tell them the truth—the truth would make her sister look bad. 

Locked in an Indiana jail to await her trial, Aster watches Ivy on the small TV hanging in the dayroom. It’s the highlight of her day, until she finds out what her sister truly thinks of her. Then, observing her sister becomes a punishment far crueler than imprisonment.

REVIEW | Play Dead

Series: D.I. Kim Stone #4
Author: Angela Marsons
Genre: adult, crime fiction, mystery, thriller
Publish: May 20, 2016
Publisher: Bookouture
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

The dead don’t tell secrets… unless you listen.
The girl’s smashed-in face stared unseeing up to the blue sky, soil spilling out of her mouth. A hundred flies hovered above the bloodied mess.  

Westerley research facility is not for the faint-hearted. A ‘body farm’ investigating human decomposition, its inhabitants are corpses in various states of decay. But when Detective Kim Stone and her team discover the fresh body of a young woman, it seems a killer has discovered the perfect cover to bury their crime.  

Then a second girl is attacked and left for dead, her body drugged and mouth filled with soil. It’s clear to Stone and the team that a serial killer is at work – but just how many bodies will they uncover? And who is next?  

As local reporter, Tracy Frost, disappears, the stakes are raised. The past seems to hold the key to the killer’s secrets – but can Kim uncover the truth before a twisted, damaged mind claims another victim …?  

The latest utterly addictive thriller from the No.1 bestseller Angela Marsons. 

REVIEW | The Writer

Series: San Juan Islands Mystery #1
Author: D.W. Ulsterman
Genre: adult, mystery, thriller
Publish: June 2, 2016
Publisher: Kindle Press
Purchase: Amazon

"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth." 
-Oscar Wilde 

College journalist Adele Plank has been granted a rare interview with one-time bestselling author, Decklan Stone. He is a man largely withdrawn from the world following the tragic death of his young wife twenty-seven years earlier. Adele ventures to the writer's remote, private-island home in the beautiful San Juan Islands, and there begins a journey of dangerous discovery that will have her scrambling to unravel a mystery far more shocking and deadly than she could have ever imagined. 

"RIVETING!"

Summer 2016 Review Train | Vanishing Girls

full review train stops can be found at Space Between the Spines

Hello,

Welcome to my Summer 2016 Review Train stop hosted by Brittany from Space Between the Spines. I hope you guys dropped by and read the reviews for the previous stops: The Unexpected Everything @ Ready, Set, Read, Future Shock @ Always Me, The Summer I Turned Pretty @ Blue Eye Books, and Even If the Sky Falls @ Tsundoku Books.

Series: N/A
Author: Lauren Oliver
Genre: young adult, contemporary, mystery, thriller
Published: March 10, 2015
Publisher: HarperCollins
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

New York Times bestselling author Lauren Oliver delivers a gripping story perfect for fans of We Were Liars and I Was Here, about two sisters inexorably altered by a terrible accident. 

Dara and Nick used to be inseparable, but that was before the accident that left Dara's beautiful face scarred and the two sisters totally estranged. 

When Dara vanishes on her birthday, Nick thinks Dara is just playing around. But another girl, nine-year-old Madeline Snow, has vanished, too, and Nick becomes increasingly convinced that the two disappearances are linked. Now Nick has to find her sister, before it's too late. 

In this edgy and compelling novel, Lauren Oliver creates a world of intrigue, loss, and suspicion as two sisters search to find themselves, and each other.

REVIEW | The White Cottage Mystery

Series: N/A
Author: Margery Allingham
Genre: adult, mystery
Publish: June 2, 2016 (first published in 1927)
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Classic Crime from the Golden Age. Margery Allingham is J.K. Rowling's favourite Golden Age author. 

Eric Crowther collected secrets and used them as weapons. Delighting in nothing more than torturing those around him with what he knew, there is no shortage of suspects when he is found dead in the White Cottage. Chief Inspector Challenor and his son Jerry will have to look deep into everyone's past – including the victim's – before they can be sure who has pulled the trigger. The fact that Jerry is in love with one of the suspects, however, might complicate things.  

The White Cottage Mystery was Margery Allingham’s first detective story, originally written as a serial for the Daily Express in 1927 and published as a book a year later.

REVIEW | Time to Die

Series: Detective Jennifer Knight #2
Author: Caroline Mitchell
Genre: adult, crime fiction, mystery, thriller, paranormal
Published: September 24, 2015
Publisher: Bookouture
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

He will predict your life… and your death. 

Don’t ever cross his palm with silver.
He will reveal your most shameful secrets.
He will predict your death.
He is hiding a secret.
He is hiding a monster. 

And all his predictions come true. 

Investigating a series of chilling murders, Detective Jennifer Knight finds herself tracking a mysterious tarot card reader known only as The Raven. 

As the death toll rises, Jennifer and her team build a picture of a serial killer on the edge of sanity, driven by dark forces. But these are not random killings. And the method behind the madness could be the most terrifying thing of all … 

Especially when it seems the death of one of their own is on the cards. 

Time to Die is an absolutely gripping serial killer thriller with a breath-taking supernatural twist.

REVIEW | A Front Page Affair

Series: Kitty Weeks Mystery #1
Author: Radha Vatsal
Genre: adult, historical fiction, mystery
Published: May 1, 2016
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark
Purchase: Amazon | Book Depository

New York City, 1959

The Lusitania has just sunk, and headlines about a shooting at J.P. Morgan's mansion and the Great War are splashed across the front page of every newspaper. Capability "Kitty" Weeks would love nothing more than to report on the news of the day, but she's stuck writing about fashion and society gossip over on the Ladies' Page - until a man is murdered as a high society picnic on her beat. 

Determined to prove herself as a journalist, Kitty finds herself plunged into the midst of a wartime conspiracy that threatens to derail the United States's attempt to remain neutral and to disrupt the privileged life she has always known. 

RADHA VATSAL's A Front Page Affair is the first book in a highly anticipated series featuring rising journalism star Kitty Weeks.

REVIEW | The Girl In the Ice

Series: DCI Erika Foster #1
Author: Robert Bryndza
Genre: adult, crime fiction, mystery, thriller
Published: February 12, 2016
Publisher: Bookouture
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Her eyes are wide open. Her lips parted as if to speak. Her dead body frozen in the ice… She is not the only one.  

When a young boy discovers the body of a woman beneath a thick sheet of ice in a South London park, Detective Erika Foster is called in to lead the murder investigation.  

The victim, a beautiful young socialite, appeared to have the perfect life. Yet when Erika begins to dig deeper, she starts to connect the dots between the murder and the killings of three prostitutes, all found strangled, hands bound and dumped in water around London.  

What dark secrets is the girl in the ice hiding?  

As Erika inches closer to uncovering the truth, the killer is closing in on Erika.  

The last investigation Erika led went badly wrong… resulting in the death of her husband. With her career hanging by a thread, Erika must now battle her own personal demons as well as a killer more deadly than any she’s faced before. But will she get to him before he strikes again?  

A page-turning thriller packed with suspense. If you like Angela Marsons, Rachel Abbott and Karin Slaughter, discover Rob Bryndza’s new series today – at a special launch price.

BLOG TOUR | A Front Page Affair

Hello,
Today I'm excited to introduce to you a A Front Page Affair by Radha Vatsal. It's a historical mystery told with a great deal of historical facts. Vatsal's words really brought me back in time as I understand and learn certain things about the time period as well as what the beginning of WWI has done to the people of United States.

The Blacksheep Project is so pleased to have Radha Vatsal share to us how she did her research for A Front Page Affair, the first book in the Kitty Weeks Mystery.

[REVIEW] Lost Girls

Series: D.I. Kim Stone #3
Author: Angela Marsons
Genre: adult, crime fiction, mystery, thriller
Published: November 6, 2015
Publisher: Bookouture
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Two girls go missing. Only one will return.  

The couple that offers the highest amount will see their daughter again. The losing couple will not. Make no mistake. One child will die.  

When nine-year-old best friends Charlie and Amy disappear, two families are plunged into a living nightmare. A text message confirms the unthinkable; that the girls are the victims of a terrifying kidnapping.  

And when a second text message pits the two families against each other for the life of their children, the clock starts ticking for D.I. Kim Stone and the squad.  

Seemingly outwitted at every turn, as they uncover a trail of bodies, Stone realises that these ruthless killers might be the most deadly she has ever faced. And that their chances of bringing the girls home alive, are getting smaller by the hour…  

Untangling a dark web of secrets from the families’ past might hold the key to solving this case. But can Kim stay alive long enough to do so? Or will someone’s child pay the ultimate price?  

The latest utterly addictive thriller from the No.1 bestseller Angela Marsons.

[REVIEW] The Art of Not Breathing

Series: N/A
Author: Sarah Alexander
Genre: young adult, contemporary, mystery
Published: April 26, 2016
Publisher: HMH Books for Young Readers
Purchase: Amazon, B&N, Book Depository

Since her twin brother, Eddie, drowned five years ago, sixteen-year-old Elsie Main has tried to remember what really happened that fateful day on the beach. One minute Eddie was there, and the next he was gone. Seventeen-year-old Tay McKenzie is a cute and mysterious boy that Elsie meets in her favorite boathouse hangout. When Tay introduces Elsie to the world of freediving, she vows to find the answers she seeks at the bottom of the sea.

Five years after the drowning of her twin brother, Scottish teenager Elsie Main confronts the tempestuous sea—and her family's tragic past—in a young adult debut that will appeal to fans of the mystery of E. Lockhart's We Were Liars and the family drama of Jandy Nelson's I'll Give You the Sun.  

[REVIEW] Brooklyn on Fire

Series: A Mary Handley Mystery #2
Author: Lawrence H. Levy 
Genre: adult, historical fiction, mystery, romance, suspense
Published: January 19, 2016
Publisher: Broadway Books
Purchase: Amazon, B&N, Book Depository

Brooklyn's most witty and daring detective risks everything to solve a dangerous triple-murder case 

After closing a case with the Brooklyn Police Department, Mary Handley is determined to become an official detective in her own right. And when Emily Worsham shows up at her new office— convinced her uncle John Worsham was murdered and desperate for answers—Mary's second assignment begins.   

As she investigates the curious circumstances surrounding John's death, Mary soon finds herself entangled in a high-stakes family scandal, a series of interconnected murders, political corruption, untrustworthy sources, and an unexpected romance with a central member of New York's elite.  

Featuring historic figures like Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and the Vanderbilt family, Brooklyn on Fire takes Mary on a wild journey from New York City to North Carolina to uncover not only the truth of one man's death, but to unravel the mystery in three murders – with links tied perilously close to her own personal world.

[COVER REVEAL] Caught Bread Handed

Series: A Bakeshop Mystery #4

Author: Ellie Alexander

Genre: adult, mystery, cozy mystery,

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Expected Publication: June 28, 2016

Purchase: Amazon | Vintage Books

Welcome to Torte—a friendly, small-town family bakeshop where the oven is heating up as high as the body count…

Jules Capshaw is still chewing over her husband Carlos’s return to Ashland, Oregon. Could there be too many cooks in the kitchen? Whatever is stirring between those two will have to wait. Despite the Oregon Shakespeare Festival being dark for the winter, the bakeshop is bustling, the dough is rolling, and there’s no rest for the weary… especially when murder is thrown into the mix.

When Mindy Nolan, the owner of a new restaurant in town, turns up dead, the batter at hand thickens. Jules knows that there was bad blood between Mindy and others in town, and tracking the killer could prove to be an unwelcome treat. And to top it all off, there’s Carlos, who is pleading—with those delicious dark eyes and sexy Spanish accent—for Jules to take him back. Is home where the heart is or will she make a fresh start… and risk getting burned?