4 stars out of 5
After finally warming up to detective investigator Jessica Daniel in the 2018 Eye for an Eye series entry, I must say that after reading this one I've cooled off again. I'm not sure why, except that Jessica seems to be more of an "It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission" kind of person than I'd like her to be.
No, that doesn't mean this book isn't good - I enjoyed it thoroughly, as I have the others I've read. And for sure I love a feisty female character, and Jessica certainly is that; but sometimes she seems to go astray with little regard for the consequences (though maybe, if the ending here is any indication, she may need to start reining herself in).
The main story has an interesting twist - one that prompted me to learn more; 14-year-old Samuel is blind, but that doesn't prevent him from "seeing" his way around amazingly well. He does that by "echolocation" - using sound (generated by clicking his tongue that bounces off objects much like sonar). He lives with his mother in a simple flat in Manchester, England, and it is there that Jessica gets involved. A couple of nasty men (or so Samuel says) broke in and as a result, his mother was killed. Samuel can describe both men by his sound clues, but he has no names nor did he actually see the two. So with few clues - including a motive - Jessica and her partner Archie set out to head up the investigation.
The neighbors aren't much help; they've all moved out months earlier. The only clue Jessica's search of the flat turns up is that somehow, some way, Samuel's mother seems to have been getting under-the-table revenue. As all this progresses, Jessica gets hints that all may not be well in her department - but clues as to what might be going on are even more scarce than in the case of Samuel's mother's death.
Everything pretty much gets resolved by the end of this book except that last bit, which I'm sure will carry over to the next one - and I'm looking forward to it. I must also commend the author for coming up with some new-to-me British words and phrases - hard to do in part because I read so many books set in the U.K. and have the great pleasure of having a daughter-in-law (and her brother) who were born in London. Beans on toast? Check. Crisps? Check. Poppadum? What the heck?
No, I won't tell you - go look it up for yourself, just as you'll have to read this book to flesh out the rest of the story. My opinion? Thumbs up! Many thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for providing me with an advance copy to read and review.
A Cry in the Night by Kerry Wilkinson (Bookouture, January 2020); 356 pp.
4 stars out of 5
I've said before that while I truly enjoy this series, I never totally warmed up to the main character, detective inspector Jessica Daniel, until Book 12 (this is the 13th). In that one she won me over, and after reading this one I remain a fan. She's a tough-as-nails, no-nonsense woman whose background issues don't get in her way - well, most of the time, anyway.
As this one begins, Jessica has received an ominous phone call from her wayward young friend Rebecca ("Bex"), who had been living with Jessica but recently disappeared with no warning. Jessica leaves Manchester, where she works and lives, to try and find her on a beach some 50 miles away. There, she notices a "missing" poster showing a young girl named Katy, who bears a strong resemblance to Bex. When Jessica calls the number on the poster, the man who answers claims to be Peter, Katy's brother.
They meet in person, but Peter has no knowledge of Bex. Disappointed, Jessica returns to her rather seedy motel room and single-handedly empties the mini-bar's contents (well okay, maybe she used both hands). When she crawls out of bed - pretty thoroughly hung over - she gets a sobering wake-up call; the man she met has been murdered. Not only was she the last known person to have seen him alive, there's blood on her car that wasn't there the day before. The local police detective is willing to cut her some slack because she's "one of them," but at the same time, she's considered a prime suspect. From that point on, it's mostly Jessica trying to stay in the shaky good graces of the law despite mounting evidence of her guilt while continuing to look for Bex on her own. The journey takes her to the bowels of the city she's in - almost literally - and reveals some nasty goings-on involving drug and human trafficking.
Needless to say, Jessica lives to see another day (or more to the point, another book), although she doesn't emerge totally unscathed. Interesting to me is the author's explanation that the series has been developed to showcase "seasons" of Jessica's life; books 8-13 are Season 2, which means the next one will mark the start of Season 3. What do I say to that? Bring it on!
Silent Suspect by Kerry Wilkinson (Bookouture, January 2019); 320 pp.
4 stars out of 5
After reading several of the author's books featuring Jessica Daniel without really relating to the Greater Manchester, England, detective investigator, I think I've finally warmed up to her. To be clear, all the books I've read have been very good - it's just that Jessica herself wasn't a character I would be eager to sit down with at a bar and share drinks. This installment, though, won me over; so Jessica, if you ever cross the Pond and land in northeastern Ohio, I'm buying.
How that mental switcheroo came about is a sort of yin-yang thing, actually. There are so many different "plots" going on in this one that it's almost hard to keep the players straight (and the bits with the rock star who thinks a ghost is out to get him and bridezilla-to-be whose fiance has gone missing are, quite honestly, borderline silly). On the other side of the equation, all those story lines provide greater insights into Jessica's background and personality, thus allowing me to get to know, and like, her better - so all's well that ends well. And speaking of endings, as is the author's norm in this series, there's a cliffhanger - but it's not nearly as in-your-face as in previous books.
Jessica is still struggling with the loss of Adam, the love of her life and the victim of a car bombing meant for Jessica. He's been in a hospital in a coma from which he's not expected to recover for quite some time, pitting her hope against reality. She's also desperate to find her teenage friend Bex, a runaway who's been living with Jessica but suddenly went missing. The primary story, though, is the release from mental hospital custody of Damian Walker, who abducted and gruesomely murdered several women 17 years earlier. Deemed "safe" for society, he's been stashed in a sort of witness protection program under a new name. Not long afterward, another woman is murdered in a similar fashion, raising suspicions that Walker is neither safe nor sane. Problem is, he wears a leg monitor 24/7 and clearly never left his house. Among those most upset is Anne, one of Walker's years-ago targets who managed to survive with serious physical and mental injuries.
After yet another woman turns up dead, Jessica and her team are charged with finding out whether Walker is somehow escaping or someone else is trying to frame him. In between, she has to deal with that very annoying bride-to-be - who's managed to make a media spectacle of herself and the cops who aren't helping her - and that rock star who seems to have taken a shine to Jessica. Oh yes, and worry that Bex flew the coop because of something Jessica said or did.
All in all, another satisfying series entry. I thank the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review it.
Eye for an Eye by Kerry Wilkinson (Pan Macmillan , January 2018; Bookouture, November 2018); 321 pp.
4 stars out of 5
My experience with the Detective Jessica Daniel series has been both warm and lukewarm so far, but this latest entry - the 11th - is one of the better ones. I must note, though, that the customary honker of a cliffhanger rears its ugly (to me) head at the end. That's because by the time the next book comes out, I'll have forgotten where this one stopped. But that said, I'll be at the ready to start a new one all the same.
After a tantalizing prologue, this story reverts to three weeks earlier, when a van transporting prisoners is hijacked and two of them escaped. Not long afterward, one is found hanging from a bridge - quite dead. This is a puzzlement for the entire Manchester Police Department, Jessica included; why on earth would someone go to the trouble of setting a prisoner free only to kill him?
Jessica's personal life is in a bit of a turmoil as well; her fiance, Adam, has been hospitalized and in a coma for months now with no sign that he'll ever recover. That notwithstanding, she's been keeping overnight company with one of her police cohorts (although in fairness, she at least has the good sense to feel guilty about it every once in a while). She's also got Bex, an abused about-to-be 18-year-old girl who's been living with Jessica while she tries to get her life back together. That takes a maudlin turn, though, when it appears a mysterious woman may be stalking Bex (or is it Jessica)? Add to the mix infighting (and a couple of murders) among casino owners - "mob" types who of course deny any involvement and don't want to play nice with the coppers - and you've got a stew of oddball situations going on at once. The fact that any one of them could go south in a New York minute keeps the action moving along quickly.
Honestly, although I do enjoy this series, I've never cared a lot for Jessica; and for sure, I don't much like Archie, her stand-in love (who comes across as more of a dolt than anything). But hey, for better or worse, it's Jessica's life - and that she's a competent enough police detective makes up for what she may lack when she finally calls it a day and goes back home. All told, then, this is a strong, easy-to-read entry in what already is a good series. Many thanks to the publisher for the opportunity to read and review it.
Nothing But Trouble by Kerry Wilkinson (Bookouture, August 2018); 367 pp.
3 stars out of 5
The story in this latest series entry is interesting and well thought out. The execution? Not so much.
Even if I don't mention the mother of all cliffhanger endings - never a way to win my heart - I kept running into "what the heck?" references I didn't quite understand simply because I've read only one of the previous books. For that reason, I can't recommend this as a standalone; to get the most out of this series, my advice is to start from the beginning.
Along the way, other issues bothered me as well. The book is set in Manchester, England - and having a wonderful, very British daughter-in-law, I'm fairly comfortable with most words, phrases and spellings that somehow were transformed when they [we] crossed the Pond (some for better, some for worse, IMHO). But in this instance, more than once something left me scratching my head and sending her an email or turning to Google for an explanation. Other times, the author seemed confused as well, such as when central character Detective Sergeant Jessica Daniel reaches for a "cookie" and a couple of sentences later is eating a "biscuit." But when she popped a single broken "crisp" into her mouth (in the States, folks, that's a lone potato chip) and immediately had trouble talking because she had a "mouth full," I pretty much lost it.
As for the plot, Jessica has dragged her live-in fiance to Piccadilly Station in hopes of catching a pickpocket who's been targeting couples like them (why she has to explain the reason they're there when Adam complains is a bit of a mystery - surely she would have told him ahead of time). But just as she realizes her own purse has been victimized, Jessica gets a call that a body has been found in a waste bin. That turns out to be Damon Potter, a 19-year-old student and college rowing team member. Meantime, Jessica and her partner, Archie Davey, have been working on another major theft case that involves a robber with a so-far unidentifiable tattoo (although this, too, turns out to be such a well-known design that I couldn't believe no one in the entire Manchester police department had ever seen it before).
The initial investigation of the rower's death reveals a possibility that hazing may have been the cause, but it's suspicious enough for Jessica to lean toward murder. Although the student president of the rowing society, Holden Wyatt, is deemed a person of interest, Jessica is gobsmacked to learn that an unknown someone or someones way above her job level are determined that Wyatt must be prosecuted whether or not he's guilty. That, plus her immediate supervisor's sudden and inexplicable cold shoulder toward her, make her wonder if her career is in jeopardy. When yet another body turns up, it matters not to the powers-that-be; that's a case of a different color, and Wyatt remains expected to go down for Potter's murder no matter what Jessica thinks.
As I said at the beginning, the basic story is of sufficient interest to keep me reading (and I do thank the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read it in exchange for an honest review). But given all the inconsistencies, I'm sorry to say this one just didn't do it for me.
Scarred for Life by Kerry Wilkinson (Bookouture, February 2018); 375 pp.
After finally warming up to detective investigator Jessica Daniel in the 2018 Eye for an Eye series entry, I must say that after reading this one I've cooled off again. I'm not sure why, except that Jessica seems to be more of an "It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission" kind of person than I'd like her to be. 
