On the longest day of the year, the tiny island of Sandhamn is overrun by people who want to party. They turn up on the ferry and dock their boats in the harbour and drink until they can’t drink anymore. As the police patrol the area, their job is to contain the crowds and make sure the fun people are having doesn’t turn sinister.
Unfortunately, this time, they aren’t that successful and, in the early hours of the morning, the body of a teenager is discovered hidden on an isolated beach. He’s been badly beaten. More unfortunate still for the police, the island is full of potential suspects, not just the teenagers girlfriend and his best friend, both of whom were missing during the hours the murder took place and too drunk to remember what happened.
There were so many people on the island and, as they start to drift away, the police are in a race against time to get statements and try and figure out just who ended the young boys life. Leading the case is one of the central characters, Thomas, a dogged and instinctive detective who is normally helped by his best friend Nora, though never in an official capacity. Nora, though has problems of her own as her boyfriend’s daughter didn’t come home that night and no one knows where she is.
Grieving for her father, a respected Detective whose footsteps she’s followed, DI Amy Winter returns to work to a letter she could never have expected to receive. It’s from a notorious serial killer, Lillian Grimes, who – along with her husband – was responsible for the death of numerous young girls offering to help her find the bodies of three victims whose graves are still unknown.
A year after the death of his son, wealthy businessman Gregory Norwood is found dead in his study from what looks like a self-inflicted gunshot.
On a dark night on a lonely road to the West of Edinburgh, a young woman crawls along the road, clinging to life and the hope she’ll be saved by a passing stranger. A chilling scene to open a chilling book, one that made me squirm more than once as I read about a series of young women brutually murdered while two of my favourite detectives, DI Luc Callanach and DCI Ava Turner, struggled to make sense of it all and find the killer.
There is something so nice about picking up a new book by a favourite author featuring a favourite character. A sense of anticipation. And also a sense of fear. What, you wonder, if it’s no good? Expectations are high, and it’s much easier to be let down as a result.
DI Marnie Rome is back and, for me, it couldn’t come a moment too soon as I was in need of a book in my favourite genre that left me feeling completely satisfied and a 
When DI Jackman’s sister-in-law commits suicide, his family finds it hard to believe. She was a loving wife and mother and didn’t seem to have any real cares in the world.
