It Was Her by Mark Hill blog tour @markhillwriter @TheCrimeVault

Source: Review Copy

BLURB

Do you want a thriller where nothing is as it seems?

Twenty years ago, Tatia was adopted into a well-off home where she seemed happy, settled. Then the youngest boy in the family dies in an accident, and she gets the blame.

Did she do it?

Tatia is cast out, away from her remaining adopted siblings Joel and Poppy. Now she yearns for a home to call her own. So when she see families going on holiday, leaving their beautiful homes empty, there seems no harm in living their lives while they are gone. But somehow, people keep ending up dead.

Did she kill them?

As bodies start to appear in supposedly safe neighbourhoods, DI Ray Drake and DS Flick Crowley race to find the thinnest of links between the victims. But Drake’s secret past is threatening to destroy everything.

MY THOUGHTS

When I read Mark Hill’s debut His First Lie (previously titled Two O’clock Boy) I thought it was one of the best debuts that I had recently read and it had one of the most compelling openings lines. So I was really excited to read his second book, It Was Her, and it certainly lived up to my expectations. Mark knows how to get the attention of his readers with captivating plots and characters.

DI Ray Drake and his colleague DS Flick Crowley are still reeling from the events which took place at the end of the previous book. Ray is clutching onto his career which is threatening to pull apart at the seams after his secret was discovered. But he soon finds himself embroiled in a murder case when a couple, who have recently returned from holiday, are found dead in their home. And soon more bodies are found. It appears that the killer is targeting people in the safety of their own homes and Ray and his team fear that more bodies will be discovered. And what has the case got to do with the death of a young boy twenty years earlier?

Mark Hill’s books are for you if you like your crime fiction dark and full of surprising revelations. What makes It Was Her really interesting is the relationship between Ray and his colleague, Flick. Unlike the rest of their team, Flick knows Ray’s secret and so there is tension simmering around them all the time as Flick is unsure if she should come clean about what she knows, which could potentially destroy both of their careers.

The mystery at the heart of the book was really compelling. The characters that are central to this part of the plot were fascinating to explore, and I really liked the depth that Mark gave them in his writing. There are some really well written scenes where I could feel the tension, and I had to keep turning the pages to find out what happens next. Creating tense scenes is certainly one of Mark’s strongest writing skills.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the second book in the DI Ray Drake series. I’m intrigued to see what Mark Hill will write next. Thank you to Millie Seaward at Little Brown for sending me a copy of the book to review and for inviting me to take part in the blog tour.

Publisher: Sphere

Publication date: 17th May 2018

Print length: 448 pages

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