Tuesday, 12 July 2016

Silent Scream by Angela Marsons


Bookouture / Zaffre
14 July 2016

The Blurb . . .

Even the darkest secrets can't stay buried forever...
Five figures gather round a shallow grave. They had all taken turns to dig. An adult-sized hole would have taken longer. An innocent life had been taken but the pact had been made. Their secrets would be buried, bound in blood...

Years later, a headmistress is found brutally strangled, the first in a spate of gruesome murders which shock the Black Country.

But when human remains are discovered at a former children's home, disturbing secrets are also unearthed. D.I. Kim Stone fast realises she's on the hunt for a twisted individual whose killing spree spans decades.

As the body count rises, Kim needs to stop the murderer before they strike again. But to catch the killer, can Kim confront the demons of her own past before it's too late?

My thoughts . . .
As an avid reader I just love finding a new talent, whether they are new to the world of publishing or just new to me personally, I love that feeling of knowing I have so much more to look forward to in the future and Angela Marsons is definitely one for me.
It’s half past midnight and I have just finished Silent Scream (honest – check my Twitter feed!) and I am too geared up to even contemplate sleeping. I am sat thinking about how wonderful it must be to be able to create such brilliant written work, to be able to take people completely out of their “real” world and totally absorb them into somewhere you have created and make them feel, make them immerse themselves, make them forget they have 4 children to feed (ooppsss!! It’s ok really, the hubby sorted them out).
This was my first taste of Marsons’ work but it will not be the last, not by a long shot.
In Silent Scream, D.I Kim Stone is called to investigate the body found dead in the bath of a house that has been set on fire. As she and her team start to investigate the suspicious circumstances, it becomes clear that this isn’t going to be an isolated case and they are in a race against the clock to find out who could be next on the killers hit list, and why.
I loved the way Marsons wrote this book, there was just enough background about each character to allow the reader to get a really good feel for them and each was a relatable and likeable (obviously apart from the villains but I’m not telling you who they are!). Kim Stone is a survivor if ever I saw one and she is so fantastically written, a stereotypical hard assed woman excelling in a man’s world, but with the most wonderful soft side that I hope we see more of the future.
The chapters are really well paced, starting nice and slow to allow the reader to get a gage of everything that is going without over-facing you with lots of unnecessary jargon and descriptive narrative. Then, when that point comes, you know the one, when the intensity levels hitch up a notch (a bit like the key change in a Westlife song and they all suddenly stand-up to sing the final part) and you just know that that is it till the last word has been read, you will not be putting this book down, the pace really speeds up but is so brilliantly written you don’t get lost.
I think this comes down to not having too many plots going on, don’t get me wrong there are twists and turns and you will be left reeling by some shocking developments but they all fit, they all make sense and they are all integral to the story. You don’t leave it thinking “What was the point in that?” like I have done with a lot of books before. Everything in this book is in it for a reason and that makes for an even better read in my humble opinion!
I loved that we didn’t have to suffer a million different suspects and their interviews, that the police officers actually got some time off to go and sleep and that they ate more than a snack from the police stations vending machine, it was really refreshing! I loved everything about this book and I really cannot recommend it enough and would like to thank The Bookbag and Bookouture for providing me a copy in exchange for my honest review.
If you like Val McDermid’s Tony Hill series and Peter James’ Roy Grace, then this series will be right up your street.
Go and buy it. Now . . .  
Go on!!

About the author . . .

Angela Marsons is the author of Amazon #1 Bestseller SILENT SCREAM.

She lives in the Black Country with her partner, their bouncy Labrador and a swearing parrot.

She first discovered her love of writing at Junior School when actual lessons came second to watching other people and quietly making up her own stories about them. Her report card invariably read "Angela would do well if she minded her own business as well as she minds other people's".

After years of writing relationship based stories (My Name Is and The Middle Child) Angela turned to Crime, fictionally speaking of course, and developed a character that refused to go away.

She is signed to Bookouture.com for a total of 8 books. The second, third and fourth books in the Kim Stone series, EVIL GAMES, LOST GIRLS and PLAY DEAD are also now available.

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