DI Nikki Galena is back and I couldn’t be happier as she is one of my favourite female detectives and the “on the Fens” series, one of my favourites too.

There are some many things to love, including that they all start with a bang, something to make you want to keep reading on.  Here, it’s a call to Nikki from a mysterious man speaking in thieves’ cant, an old fashioned secret code (think cockney rhyming slang).  People, he says are going to die – and he is going to be the one doing the killing.

It all seems linked to a series of burglaries that the team are already working on, though it’s not clear how or what this mysterious man’ (who they nickname Mad Tom) ultimate aim is, other than teach Nikki a lesson.  

Nikki is the next thing to love about this series.  She is kind, caring, good to her team but tough as nails.  I have really warmed to her over the four books in this series I have read (I still have the first four to go but I’ll get there).  She isn’t damaged in the way some other female detectives I read are, though she has some baggage I’m not 100% on from the first few books, and she isn’t such a wildcard.

Again, this is something I like because I am really enjoying getting to know her team, who are becoming fully fledged characters in their own right.  Over the last few books, each has had a turn being front and centre and a main player in the plot.  Last time it was Cat.  This time, it’s actually Nikki’s mom, Eve, that has a big role to play.

Eve is an incredible woman.  A former RAF officer who has also worked for some secret service or other, she is as tough as Nikki and clever and determined.  Here, she starts looking into the sudden death of a friend that becomes police business.  I feel like that this could have been a story in its own right if I’m honest, I was that engrossed.

Other than this maybe having been two books instead of one (which I think I thought for the last book as well, so there is a theme developing here), there is nothing that I didn’t like about this book.  The writing is great, the characters compelling and the story full of twists and turns, making it a real page turner.  It really is a great book and I loved it.

About the book…

DI Nikki Galena gets a series of anonymous calls. She is told the place, time, and who will die.

But the messages are in a secret language used only by villains. Nikki and her team must decode the riddles and work out where the threats are coming from.

Meanwhile, the Fens have been hit by a series of “designer burglaries.” It appears that a new gang of thieves are stealing to order.

And things get very close to home when a friend of Nikki’s mother dies suddenly and perhaps suspiciously.

Do any of these events relate, and can Nikki stop the thieves on the fens, before anyone else dies?

Source: Netgalley
Publisher: Joffe
Number of Pages: 261
Format: ebook

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