Today I’m the book tour for The Feud on Dead Lane by Robert W Kirby, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos Book Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part.
Pages: 417
Synopsis: “Two tough families—Two mysterious deaths—One night of brutal violence.”
Nino and Elena dream of sharing a normal life together. They are desperate to escape the shadow of Nino’s domineering and dangerous family, the Bartells.
After a shocking revelation is made, and a family member dies in strange circumstances, Elena urges Nino to take drastic action.
But some outsiders are drawn into the mix. Two best friends who have made a grave mistake, a no-nonsense financial adviser searching for his missing son, and a proud new mum. Soon all of them will be caught up in a deadly world where betrayal, violence and even cold-blooded murder are acceptable methods of settling scores.
Will anybody walk away unscathed?
About The Author: Robert was born in 1979 and lives in Kent with his wife, children, and bonkers dalmatian, Dexter.
He ran a private investigation agency for over fifteen years, dealing in cases that involved breach of contract claims, commercial debt recovery, and process serving. Robert’s agency also specialised in people tracing; so much of his work revolved around tracking down debtors, dealing in adoption matters, and locating missing persons. At times, he worked on some pretty bizarre cases and dealt with plenty of interesting and sometimes colourful individuals.
Since 2014, Robert has worked self-employed in the pet care industry, and is a keen trail runner, mountain biker and kayaker. Robert has a huge passion for screenwriting for many years and started writing novels during the first lockdown.
His first novel, The Tests, published on Amazon in 2021, was based on a spec screenplay that he originally wrote back in 2009. The Tests was then republished with Inkubator Books in 2022 under the new title – The Wrong Girl. Robert’s second novel, The Feud on Dead Lane, a dark and gritty crime thriller, will also be out soon.
If you like the sound of this it can be bought here!And it’s also on Kindle Unlimited!
Today I’m on the tour for Broken Screams by Sally Rigby and I have a spotlight for you, please accept my apologies this was supposed to be up yesterday but it wasn’t in my calendar. Thank you to Zoé at Zooloos Book Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part.
Bare in mind that this is book 12 in the Cavendish and Walker series, although it can be read as a standalone.
Synopsis: Scream all you want, no one can hear you….
When an attempted murder is linked to a string of unsolved sexual attacks, Detective Chief Inspector Whitney Walker is incensed. All those women who still have sleepless nights because the man who terrorises their dreams is still on the loose.
Calling on forensic psychologist Dr Georgina Cavendish to help, they follow the clues and are alarmed to discover the victims all had one thing in common. Their birthdays were on the 29th February. The same date as a female officer on Whitney’s team.
As the clock ticks down and they’re no nearer to finding the truth, can they stop the villain before he makes sure his next victim will never scream again.
Broken Screams is the twelfth book in the acclaimed Cavendish & Walker series and is perfect for fans of Angela Marsons, Helen H Durrant and Rachel McClean.
About The Author:
Sally Rigby was born in Northampton, in the UK. She has always had the travel bug, and after living in both Manchester and London, eventually moved overseas. From 2001 she has lived with her family in New Zealand (apart from five years in Australia), which she considers to be the most beautiful place in the world.
After writing young adult fiction for many years, under a pen name, Sally decided to move into crime fiction. Her Cavendish & Walker series brings together two headstrong, and very different, women – DCI Whitney Walker, and forensic psychologist Dr Georgina Cavendish. Sally has a background in education, and has always loved crime fiction books, films and TV programmes. She has a particular fascination with the psychology of serial killers.
If you like the sound of this it is on Kindle Unlimited and and can be bought here!
Today I’m on the tour for City of Sin by Sean O’Leary, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos Book Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part.
Synopsis: In the stifling heat of a Sydney summer, young Rhia is being hunted.
She was in the wrong place at the wrong time; now, both the police and a right-wing group of fanatics are after her. The only one on her side is Indigenous investigator Carter Thompson from the Prosecutors Office.
In Rhia’s possession is a stolen USB full of secrets that could destroy the New Light Church. After NLC sets their attack dog, P.I. Sally Bois on the case, Thompson and Bois clash and race against time to find Rhia.
With a dangerous plan in motion, can Rhia and Carter clear her name – or is it already too late?
City Of Sin is the first book in Sean O’Leary’s riveting crime series set in Sydney, Australia.
This book contains adult content and is not recommended for readers under the age of 18.
About The Author:
Sean O’Leary is a writer from Melbourne, Australia. He has published two literary short story collections, ‘My Town’ and ‘Walking’. His literary novella ‘Drifting’ was the winner of the ‘The Great Novella Search 2016’ and published in 2017. He self published ‘The Heat’ his crime novella set in Darwin and Bangkok in 2019. ‘Drifting’ and ‘The Heat’ will be re-published by Next Chapter in 2022/23. His second crime novella ‘Preston Noir’ was published in 2020 in ‘Crime Double Feature…Neo Noir’ from the indie press ‘Zombie Pirate Publishing.
’ His crime fiction collection ‘Wonderland‘ was recently published by the down and dirty folk at Close to the Bone Publishing in the United Kingdown. His new crime novel ‘Going All the Way’ and short story collection ‘Tokyo Jazz & Other Stories’ are both be published by Next Chapter and out now.
City of Sin is the first book in his new Sydney crime series featuring Indigenous investigator Carter Thompson.
He likes to walk all over the face of the earth, travel as often as he can, supports Melbourne Football Club (a life sentence) enjoys art but knows nothing about it, is a film buff and writes like a demon.
If you like the sound of this you can buy it here!
Today I’m on the book tour for From The Deep by Kateri Stanley, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos book tours for organising it and inviting me to take part.
Pages: 294
Synopsis: Julian Finch, widower and fisherman, awakes to learn that the bodies of two colleagues have washed up on the beach of Drake Cove. The close-knit community is under fierce public scrutiny due to a long-standing tradition called “The Culling”, the annual slaughter of pilot whales for consumption. An act which divides the nation.
The suspects are the extreme animal rights group, the Fighters Against Animal Cruelty (FAAC) who go wherever the politics is trending. They’ve been harassing the small fishing town for many years, smashing up their boats and sending vicious hate mail.
Tensions mount after a viral video, uploaded by the FAAC of Julian killing a pregnant whale, causes uproar online and in real life. In the aftermath, Julian becomes the victim of hate crime. In order to avoid further life-threatening attacks, Julian and his daughter take refuge in the home of Frank Blothio: ex-fisherman turned writer and political activist who does not have the best history with the animal rights movement, or Drake Cove as a whole.
As Julian integrates into the Blothio way of life, he discovers heinous secrets and disturbing truths lurking beneath the skin of his hometown that will change his life forever.
About The Author:
Kateri Stanley is a pseudonym for the multi-genre fiction writer. Since being a child, Kateri has been inspired by the wondrous mediums of books, music, TV and film. After working in the healthcare industry for eight years and studying for an Arts and Humanities degree, she made the decision to move cities in the West Midlands and live with her ever-suffering partner and their two cats. Her debut novel Forgive Me was published by indie press house, Darkstroke Books, in 2021 and it reached #1 in the US Horror Fiction charts on Amazon. She is currently working on her third novel, Bittersweet Injuries.
If you like the sound of this it can be bought here!
Today I’m on the tour for Only Hummingbirds Fly Backwards by Rosie Parker, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.
Pages: 312
Synopsis: Ronnie and Jake are twins – obviously not identical, but close as. They even have that twin intuition thing going on. Ronnie lives with her soon-to-be husband and new-born baby, and Jake is happily married with two daughters. One sunny April day, he hops onto somebody else’s motorbike to ride home when a horrific crash leaves him lying brain injured on the road. On hearing the news Ronnie rushes to Jake’s bedside. Having once been a physiotherapist, she knows it’s bad, and her life threatens to crack apart as she begs him to return to her. Fifteen months later, it’s suggested by Jake’s wife that the two families go away to Brittany, France, on holiday. But surely, it’s too soon, thinks Ronnie. The tensions and events which follow threaten to rock both Ronnie’s marriage and her relationship with her sister-in-law, as she tries to reach Jake. And when secrets from their past begin to surface, will Ronnie seek comfort from another man? At the heart of it all is Jake, who is more than her brother, he is her twin. Once they floated side by side in their mother’s womb. Can Ronnie somehow remind him of the person he once was, or is he changed forever? The world turns with or without them, a butterfly flaps its wings, and only hummingbirds fly backwards.
About the Author: Rosie Parker had a portfolio career including physiotherapy, medical rehabilitation and disability research, before returning to her first love, creative writing. She now has an MA in Creative Writing and is a tutor in Creative Writing at The Open University. A spoken word performer and novelist, Rosie writes in her blue shed on a hill overlooking the Bristol Channel. Rosie Parker identifies as a disabled author living with hypermobile-Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, and this is her debut novel.
If you like the sound of this book it can be bought here!
Today km on the tour for Death In Blitz City by David Young, thank you to Tracy at Compulsive Readers for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.
Pages: 372
Synopsis: 1942, Hull, East Yorkshire – It is the most heavily-bombed city outside of London – but for the sake of national morale the Hull Blitz is kept top secret. Only the politicians in Whitehall and Hull’s citizens themselves know of the true chaos. Newly-posted Inspector Ambrose Swift cannot believe the devastation he finds. But for Swift and his two deputies – part-time bare-knuckle boxer Jim ‘Little’ Weighton and Dales farmer’s daughter Kathleen Carver – it’s murder, not the war, that’s at the forefront of their minds. When a series of sadistic killings is wrongly blamed on locally-stationed black American GIs, Swift, a one-armed former WW1 cavalryman who tours the rubble-strewn city on a white horse, soon discovers these are no ordinary murders. The fetid stench of racism, corruption and perversion go to the very top. And for Swift, Weighton and Carver, finding the real killers means putting their own lives at risk – because powerful forces in the US and Britain cannot let the war effort be undermined. Not even by the truth.
My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧
My Thoughts: A well put together historical police procedural story.
We’re following Ambrose Swift and Jim Weighton as they’re thrown in to a case that on the surface looks simple, a dead body outside a shelter that was recently bombed by the Nazis, but on closer inspection it doesn’t look like she was killed in the blast at all.. her heart had been ripped out & it looks professional…
As they follow the leads they soon find that they need a female touch for the possible witnesses, enter Karen Carver, a woman who can really hold her own in any situation.
Bodies keep appearing and the US Military are willing to let an innocent man take the rap to keep the peace!
This is an adrenaline filled fast paced story that will really keep you on your toes. I loved all of the main characters individually but thought they worked incredibly as a team!
Here’s hoping this is the start of a new series for me to get lost in! I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to any of them and felt they had more to give.
Lots of secrecy and lots of mysteries to uncover, this one had me hooked from start to finish
Today I’m on the tour for The Accident by Daniel Hurst, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos Book Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.
Pages: 248
Synopsis: One moment. Three lives changed forever.
Single mum Anni would do anything for her little boy, Tobi, he is the center of her world. So she is utterly devastated when Tobi is run over and killed by drunk driver, Carl.
Anni hates Carl for what he’s done and takes some comfort from the lengthy prison sentence he is serving. But she can’t live on hate and after a time spent grieving for her son, Anni returns to work and tries to move on with her life. She is lonely without Tobi and glad to make a new friend, Jo.
But Jo has a secret. She is connected to the fatal accident in a way that Anni never suspects. And Jo is determined that Anni will never discover the awful truth about what really happened that day.
As the two women grow closer, Anni begins to feel that her new friend is keeping something from her.
A terrible suspicion begins to dawn and Anni starts to dig deeper into Jo’s past. Will she discover the horrifying truth? Or will she find out just how far some people go to cover up their mistakes…
My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧
My Thoughts: Daniel has done it again and created a read that is horrifying and impossible to put down full of characters that seem unbelievably ordinary yet very relatable.
It really puts into perspective that life really can change in just a matter of seconds and one wrong decision can alter everything you’ve come to know.
Every single one of our characters makes more than one wrong decision which means that although we already know the ultimate consequences from the beginning that we are constantly left guessing.. right until the last chapter.
I wanted to hug Anni, whilst shaking Jo and spent a lot of the book angry at Carl 😂
Full of short snappy chapters that are regularly left on a cliffhanger and told from multiple perspectives which means it’s impossible to put down because the usual “just one more chapter” doesn’t work!
This book made me feel real emotions, had my heart beating fast, whilst also leaving it in my throat.. the writing is so immersive that it made me feel like I was in the book, yet I couldn’t stop the characters from making terrible decisions!
After reading multiple books from Daniel and loving every single one I think it’s fair to say that he is now a favourite author.
Today I’m on the tour for From Sorrows Hold by Jonathan Peace, thank you to Rebecca at Hobeck Books for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you for my copy.
Pages: 360
Synopsis: December, 1988
Christmas beckons What should be a time of excitement and joy is forever tainted when a teenager’s body is found in the graveyard of Ossett’s Holy Trinity Church.
A suspected suicide As they respond to the devastating event, WDCs Louise Miller and Elizabeth Hines, together with psychologist Karla Hayes, each use their own experiences of suicide to help the wider community as it struggles to understand the terrible choice that was made.
Another missing teenager Louise starts to believe there is something even more sinister behind the events…
My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧
My Thoughts: This is the second book in the Detective Louise Miller series and it reminded me why I loved the other one so much!
We’re following Louise Miller and Beth Hines as yet again they form a formidable team to get to the truth, they don’t always see eye to eye but they’re not afraid to have it out with each other and discuss things.
Louise is at church with her Aunt when a young girl walks in covered in blood, Louise jumps straight into work mode and it doesn’t take her long to discover the body of a young boy who it appears has taken his own life.. although for Louise things are never that simple so despite everyone around her telling her she’s wrong, she’s determined to dig a little deeper.
Throw in a protest group who feel that suicide is wrong and the families of those that commit such an act should be punished, a prostitute, and a whole host of characters who seem to know more than they are letting on and what you have is a book that is impossible to put down & the twists just keep coming right until the very end.
Today I’m on the tour for The Measure by Nikki Erlick, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.
Pages: 368
Synopsis: Eight Ordinary people. One extraordinary choice.
It seems like just another morning.
You make a cup of tea. Check the news. Open the front door.
On your doorstep is a box.
Inside the box is the exact number of years you have left to live.
The same box appears on every doorstep across the world.
Do you open yours?
My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧
My. Thoughts: thought provoking and heartbreaking, what a brilliant debut novel!
You wake up one morning with a box on your doorstep that says “the measure of your life lies within” would you open it?!
This is the dilemma that faces the entire world one morning in March & we’re following 8 people who make the decision that is right for them and then have to face the consequences!
Each chapter is told from the perspective of one of the main characters I love a multi perspective book so once I realised this I was hooked, I did worry that it would get confusing with their being so many but Nikki’s writing is flawless, subtle differences in each of the characters made it easy to tell who was who.
You find yourself really getting lost in the story and wishing that you could change the fate of some of these characters. Some were easy to love and support, others were easy to hate. The clever part was the fact that she created characters who seem like they’re on the fence and you don’t know what side they will be on until the last minute.
I devoured this book. I couldn’t put it down!
This is one of the best dystopian novels I’ve ever read and cannot recommend it highly enough.
Today I’m on the tour for The Ghost of Ivy Barn by Mark Stay, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part.
I have an extract for you today! but before I post it let me tell you about the book!
This is book 3 in The Witches of Woodville series!
Synopsis: The Witches of Woodville Part 3
August 1940
In a quiet village in rural Kent, the enemy is at the gates . . .
The Battle of Britain rages and Faye Bright encounters the ghost of a pilot who won’t give up the fight. Before she can help him, Faye is whisked away to join a motley crew of witches to perform a top secret ritual on the White Cliffs of Dover that could repel the invaders.
But there’s a catch. The ritual must be executed in the nuddy. Mrs Teach threatens mutiny. Miss Charlotte is intrigued. And Faye wants to call the whole thing off when she suspects there’s a spy in their midst.
It’s up to Faye Bright to uncover the traitor, all while dealing with the ghost haunting Ivy Barn who may hold the key to the truth. But first, Faye has to learn to fly . . .
About the Author:
Mark Stay got a part-time Christmas job at Waterstone’s in the nineties (back when it still had an apostrophe) and, despite being working class and quite lippy, somehow ended up working in publishing for over 25 years. He would write in his spare time and sometimes those writings would get turned into books and films, including the Witches of Woodville series from Simon & Schuster, and the forthcoming Warner Bros. horror movie Unwelcome.
Mark is also co-presenter of the Bestseller Experiment podcast, which has inspired writers all over the world to finish and publish their books. Born in London, he lives in Kent with Youtube gardener and writer Claire Burgess and a declining assortment of retired chickens.
And now for the extract 🥰s
Extract:
Bertie Butterworth’s Battle of Britain Diary Friday 9th August, 1940
Started with distant gunfire in the morning. Air raid warning from 3–7pm. Big raid at night. Lots of flashes. Maybe twenty planes shot down. Think two planes crashed nearby. Must investigate. Made Spam hash today. Bit salty. Had a strange dream where me and Faye were riding bicycles in the sky. It was so peaceful up there. I wanted to hold her hand, but the wind kept pushing us apart. Can’t stop thinking about Faye. I think about her when I wake up, I think about her when I’m fixing Dad’s tractor, I think about her when I’m pulling a pint in the pub, and I think about her when I go to sleep. Is that normal?
Faye Bright’s teeth rattled as her Pashley Model A bicycle shuddered down the bumpy coast road towards the village of Woodville. The moon lingered, pale in the brightening sky, though the morning sun was already warm and the sea glistened. Waves beckoned her to hop in and splash about. Faye was tempted, though the beaches were littered with barbed wire and wrought-iron crosses and other such invasion defences, so a quick paddle was out of the question.
Faye was also knackered. Having just finished an all-night Air Raid Precaution coast watch with Freddie Paine, she was ready to curl up into a ball, duck under her bedsheets and kip the whole day.
It had been an intense evening. Faye lost count of how many planes tumbled into that same sea last night. At least twenty. The Luftwaffe bombers stayed high, and some of the fighters would come down and shoot barrage balloons like it was a game. Mr Paine seemed calm enough. Standing stock-still, gripping his binoc- ulars, calmly telling her how he had seen the bodies of pilots fished out of the water the day before, all while the sky was lit up like fireworks night. Faye had always felt safe on ARP duties with Mr Paine, but last night was the first time she’d had the terrible thought that they might actually lose this war. She tried to shake the thought away, but it lingered even now like a bad smell.
Faye hadn’t felt right for weeks. Not since that busi- ness with the Bavarian Druid Otto Kopp. In an effort to save three Kinderstransportchildren from a raven- ous demon, she had been forced to take them across a magical threshold into an endless void. For some time she stood alone in that strange darkness with the moon, and its incredible ancient power had coursed through her. She could feel it still, fizzing in her belly and her brain as if waiting for something.
Faye rounded a bend and could see the bell tower of Saint Irene’s Church poking over the tops of trees when Larry Dell ran out into the road and flagged her down.
‘Faye! Faye Bright, have you got a mo’?’
Larry’s farm was one of the biggest in the area. He mainly grew brassicas, hops and barley, and had recently dabbled in a bit of livestock, starting with a dozen sheep. Larry was a pleasant enough fellow, with a lower jaw that jutted out and an impressive dent in the top-right corner of his forehead. Rumour had it that he got the dent while leading a charge at the Battle of Ypres, though Faye’s dad said Larry was kicked in the head while shoeing a horse and had never fully recovered.
Faye squeezed her bicycle’s brakes and came skidding to a halt.
‘Morning, Larry. Where’s the fire?’
If you like the sound of this it can be bought here!
prdgreads 