From the #1 bestseller and Queen of Thrillers comes a gripping suspense perfect for fans of Karin Slaughter and Angela Marsons No one can protect you from your past… When a young woman is found strangled in her own bedroom, DS Imogen Grey and DS Adrian Miles are plunged into an investigation to find a twisted serial killer who likes to date his victims before he kills them. Determined to stop … them.
Determined to stop the horrific deaths, Imogen is forced to act as bait – but will she get caught in her own trap? As the search for the killer ramps up, attention falls on the strange new boy in town. Why does he watch his neighbours through the windows? And could the truth be closer to home than any of them realise?
READERS CAN’T GET ENOUGH OF KATERINA DIAMOND’S TWISTY THRILLERS
‘A deliciously dark read, Katerina Diamond keeps her readers guessing throughout as she leads us on a very secretive, VERY twisted journey…everything I was expecting from a well-written, pacy thriller’ LISA HALL, AUTHOR OF BETWEEN YOU AND ME
‘A dark, twisting tale that won’t fail to captivate’ MINT VELVET
‘This fluid tale about a girl being held hostage is relentless and uncompromisingly dark’ HEAT
‘This gem of a crime novel is packed with twists until the last page’ CLOSER
‘Wow, I thought THE TEACHER was fantastic but THE SECRET is on another level. Was gripped all the way through and kept me guessing as the story unfolded’ NETGALLEY REVIEWER
‘An impeccable novel with nail biting chapters… Katerina Diamond deserves the title of Queen of Crime, because I’ll be damned if anyone writes novels like she does. 5* doesn’t do this book justice’ THE BRUNETTE BOOKSHELF
‘A dark and twisted tale that had me gasping in fear’ HANDWRITTEN GIRL
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Brilliant! One of the best books I’ve read this year. I’m now going to have to go back and read the earlier books in the series.
There are three separate strands of the story, a serial killer. a teenager struggling to cope with his alcoholic father and a woman in an abusive relationship. After a while, you realise they are connected and you’re on the edge of your seat dreading how they are going to collide.
Highly recommend to readers of crime thrillers and police procedurals.
This is the first book in the DS Imogen Grey series I have read…and it won’t be the last! There are several threads that appear throughout the book. And while you think you wonder in the back of your mind if they are really woven together or just stray strands.
The characters are well developed and you will find yourself developing strong feelings about each one. The secret behind “what Connor did” keeps you guessing until the end of the book. There are hints about the emotional trauma experienced, but you don’t know the details until the end.
I also enjoyed the viewpoint of the women who were being targeted via on-line before they meet their mystery man … and during the actual murder. It makes the women feel real and you want them to be able to find that special someone with whom to begin a meaningful relationship.
Get ready for twists and turns and shocking secrets to be revealed as you flip through the pages as fast as you can! Great mystery and I am so ready for the next book in the series. In fact, I will be going back and reading the first three books in the series.
Thank you to NetGalley and Avon Publishing for my advanced review copy. All opinions and thoughts are my own.
Very slow read, took me forever to finish and I was happy when it was over!
Interesting view into English police work and the extent of threat from current electronic media.
Sometimes a little too comlex.
First, the blurb I read on NetGalley is quite a bit different than the one on the retail sites, and while technically, both could describe this book, neither are exactly accurate. I also have to mention the cover. It’s certainly eye-catching, but I can’t for the life of me figure out what it has to do with this story. Our serial killer is strangling women, so I’m not sure where the blood comes in as I don’t recall any in the book. As for the rest of it, I also don’t recall any mention of a music box or a ballerina, so I used that handy little search feature on my Kindle and got nothing, not one mention of either of those in the book. Don’t get me wrong, the cover is brilliant, but I don’t see the correlation to the story. Speaking of which, I have to say that this one drove me a bit crazy. We have several characters throughout with rapid-fire jumps from one point of view to another. Off the top of my head, we have various victims of the serial killer, both detectives, a troubled and troublesome teenager, and what appears to be diary entries from an unknown woman. I would say that this is a police procedural, except they don’t really do that much in the way of investigation. More time is spent on the fact that one is stressing over ending a relationship with a rather unsavory man that could cause problems in her job, and the other is grieving a girlfriend who was murdered while dealing with his ex and his son living under his roof because of some problem with the ex’s current husband. I thought there may be some real investigation about to start when Imogen acts as bait, but even that was more about how Adrian felt about the whole thing. Then we have Connor and his father who have a rocky relationship that only gets rockier with each passing day while Connor apparently is completely irresistible to women of all ages. If it all sounds a bit convoluted, it is for much of the book. While I understand that the abrupt chapter endings are meant to build suspense and tension, the only thing that built in me was a growing aggravation over where it was all going. Things do eventually come together and the seemingly separate storylines converge, but not until quite late in the book. We do get enough breadcrumbs that I figured it out before the the big reveal, but that was little payoff for a story that took a somewhat circuitous route to get to a rushed and unsatisfactory ending. From glancing through the many high ratings on this one, I realize that I’m in the minority here, but it is what it is and my opinion is just that. The book did sound quite promising, but for me, it just didn’t live up to its potential.
Thank you Net Gallery and Avon Book UK for this fantastic read.
This is a dark and twisted novel for sure. Grey and Miles are detectives that are trying to stop a serial killer. This story is interwoven with Connor and his high school friends not to mention his dad. Connor and his dad come to the states to get away from a school shooting that somehow Connor was or wasn’t a part of. He likes that no one knows him here and he can start all over. This book has great character build up and a plot that is different from a lot of other books. I would read more by this author as I like how she puts words into sentences that go onto a great plot.