May 26

Only The Brave – Mel Sherratt

Only The BraveWhen one of the notorious Johnson brothers is murdered and a bag of money goes missing, a deadly game of cat and mouse is set in motion.

DS Allie Shenton and her team are called in to catch the killer, but the suspects are double-crossing each other and Allie has little time to untangle the web of lies.

As she delves deeper into the case, things take a personal turn when Allie realises she is being stalked by the very same person who attacked her sister seventeen years ago and left her for dead.

Set over forty-eight tension-filled hours, Only the Brave is the latest gut-churning police procedural from acclaimed author Mel Sherratt.

 

Thanks to Mel Sherratt and her publishers, Thomas & Mercer, for the chance to read Only the Brave through Netgalley.

 

Only the Brave is the third novel in the Allie Shenton series. It picks up events after Follow The Leader and concludes the story arc first established in Taunting the Dead. I believe that Only the Brave could be read and enjoyed as a stand-alone novel (Ms Sherratt covers all the background required) however, reading all three books in order would be beneficial to get the full impact of the story. It would also be a good way to enjoy three cracking books.

Minor spoiler there – Only The Brave is indeed cracking. The story plays out over a two day period, the cast of suspects is relatively small and they all interlink in some way. Everyone has a secret, everyone is working to protect themselves and (it seems) everyone is prepared to lie to the police.

Seeking to unpick the lies is Allie Shenton, however, Allie has her own share of personal problems – not least the unwelcome attentions of a stalker who has previously attacked her sister and now has his sights set on Allie. Juggling the pressure of murder investigation and the challenge of being there for her family is taking its toll on Allie and the cracks are starting to show.

The suspect pool in this novel are a particularly nasty lot and Mel Sherratt has done a masterly job of highlighting their worst traits, their neurosis, anxiety and deceitful natures. There is no love lost between the characters and they will gladly sacrifice friendship or loyalty to save their own skins. All this makes for fun reading and you cannot help but feel more than a little smug as each get a dose of their own medicine.

I raced through Only The Brave and enjoyed every second. I like Mel Sherratt’s writing style which is nicely grounded: gritty and believable stories that are fun to read. I hope that Allie Shenton will return in the future, she is a character I want to read more of.

 

Mel Sherratt is on Twitter: @writermels

And is online at : http://melsherratt.co.uk/

 

 

 

 

 

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February 13

Follow The Leader – Mel Sherratt

Follow The LeaderA man’s body is found on a canal towpath. In his pocket, a magnetic letter in the shape of an E.

Days later, a second victim is found, this time with the letter V tucked into her clothing.

As the body count rises, the eerie, childlike clues point to a pattern that sends DS Allie Shenton and her colleagues into full alert.

The race is on. Allie and the team must work quickly to determine where the killer will strike next. The rules are simple but deadly—to catch the killer, they must follow the leader.

From the acclaimed author of Taunting the Dead comes a flesh-creeping tale of a child’s game with a terrifying, grown-up twist. This is the second book in the DS Allie Shenton series but can be enjoyed as a stand-alone story.

 

My review copy was provided through Netgalley.

 

When I lurk around Twitter I look to see what other book bloggers are reading. Every now and then you find that one book will dominate the chat or one author will grab the spotlight. However, over a period of several months I noticed that Mel Sherratt’s name cropped up frequently and always positively. A little more investigation revealed that the bloggers I engage with most frequently have been reading and enjoying the Allie Shenton books – it was time for me to catch up.

Having been let down by the ‘buzz’ surrounding one or two high profile novels in 2014 I was delighted to find that Follow The Leader fully justified the positivity from the blogging community – I was hooked by a brilliant story.

As the intro explains, this is the second book in the DS Shenton series. Obviously, I have not read the first book and I generally try to avoid jumping into a series when I know there are earlier volumes to read. I was pleased to find that there were no continuity problems which could have impaired my enjoyment of Follow The Leader – everything I needed to know was deftly dropped into the plot without the feeling I was reading the “recap chapter.”

Follow The Leader was a great read – Shenton is a likeable central character, seemingly fighting a losing battle to maintain a work/life balance.  She finds herself embroiled in a murder investigation where it appears that a killer that is specifically targeting former pupils of her old high school. It is clear to Shenton and the investigating team that the murders are linked as the killer is leaving a magnetic plastic letter at the scene of each crime.

What I particularly liked about Follow The Leader (as I also noted when I recently reviewed Karen Long’s The Vault) was that the reader gets to see who the murderer is quite early in the story. This means that we can keep tabs on the investigation while also having the benefit of discovering who the next victim will be – usually before they become a victim! I refer to this as the Columbo effect (my reading preferences clearly shaped by Peter Falk).

Follow The Leader keeps a good pace throughout and there were plenty of action points and surprises that kept me reading well into the wee small hours. There is a clear sign of an ongoing story which began in book 1 (Taunting The Dead), flows through Follow and looks likely to spin on into book 3. A nice way to ensure I will definitely return to see how Allie Shenton copes with what seems to be coming her way.

In short: great fun, well written and held my attention throughout with the added bonus of a cliffhanger that will make me a guaranteed reader of the next book. Everything I want from my crime thrillers so a review score of five out of five seems to be in order. Highly recommended.

 

You can follow Mel Sherratt on Twitter @writermels    Follow The Leader and Taunting The Dead are available now…go get them!

One last update – just before I posted my review of Follow The Leader I discovered that the next Allie Shenton book, Only The Brave, is due for release on 26th May. Already excited for that!

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