Meet Sunday Night, a woman with physical and psychological scars, and a killer instinct…

Sunnie has spent years running from her past, burying secrets and building a life in which she needs no one and feels nothing. But a girl has gone missing, lost in the chaos of a bomb explosion, and the family needs Sunnie s help.

Is the girl dead? Did someone take her? If she is out there, why doesn’t she want to be found? It’s time for Sunnie to face her own demons because they just might lead her to the truth about what really happened all those years ago.

Like many people out there, I have been a fan of Kathy Reichs every since reading her first Temperance Brennan / Bones novel.  With those, Tempe became a familiar figure, one I felt I knew and one I liked a lot.  With familiarity though might not come contempt but definitely comes less excitement when a new book is released, especially with a TV show attached; somewhere along the way I stopped picking up the latest instalment.

Then I saw Two Nights, a new novel with a new character, and that familiar excitement was back again…I felt I had to read this book because, despite not being excited by Bones any more, this had nothing to do with thinking Reichs wasn’t a good writer – she is – and a good storyteller – she’s that too.  Both apply here, with what is a cracking story and a great central character – Sunday Night – who is uniquely damaged (as all the best characters in crime fiction are) and absolutely intriguing (I am really hoping this is the first in a new series).

The story on the face of it seems simple – a young girl is missing after a local school is bombed and her mother and brother dead.  Her grandmother wants justice and has the money to pay to get it and the connections to find the right person to do the job.  That right person is Sunday, a former soldier and detective who now lives off the grid and under the radar.

Sunday is tough, really tough, and hard to love.  She isn’t unlikeable though, which – as you may know from reading other reviews – is really important to me.  I have to like the people between the pages or I lose interest in them and their story.  Sunday’s story, I wanted to know.  I eventually found it out, and it’s pretty dark; it’s no wonder she doesn’t trust anyone or that she is determined to do the right thing, even if that involves ignoring the law when she has to.

It’s her voice you hear throughout and so you get to understand the workings of her mind pretty well.   You see in it a confused person but a good one.  You also see someone who doesn’t know how to take no for an answer and knows how to fight.  Her storytelling style is short and sharp…there is a little of the old school detective novels here – words aren’t minced – which I liked.  It kept the story moving along and me interested.  In fact, I don’t think I got bored or found my mind wandering once.  With my reading so many of this genre, that’s hard to do.

It’s also hard to keep me guessing – I often figure out the who, why and where pretty early on.  Good writing can keep me reading but there isn’t that buzz of not knowing that I love.  I had that here.  There was one point in particular where I thought one thing and realised I was completely wrong and it brought a smile to my lips.  Loved it – and loved the book…can’t recommend it enough.

Enjoy!

Emma x

 

Source: Netgalley
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: 11th July, 2017
Format: ebook
Pages: 336
Genre: mystery / crime
Find on: Amazon UK / Amazon US / Goodreads

I received a copy of this book in return for a fair and honest review. All thoughts, feelings and opinions are my own.