When the Waters Recede
by Graham Smith
When a car is pulled from raging floodwaters with a dead man in the front and the decapitated body of an evil woman in the boot, Cumbria’s Major Crimes Team are handed the investigation.
The woman is soon recognized, but the man cannot be identified and this leads the team and their former leader, Harry Evans, into areas none of them want to visit.
Before they know it, they’re dealing with protection scams and looking for answers to questions they didn’t know needed to be asked.
My
Rating:
Favorite
Quotes:
Blessed with neither looks nor brains,
she’d fought her way through life, powered by nothing more than a sharp tongue
and a cruel streak... Such was her popularity, the list of suspects for her
murder wouldn’t be a short one. Everyone who spent more than five seconds in
her company could be added to the list, as they’d be sure to want her dead.
She was a right vicious piece of work. If she fell into the
Amazon even the piranhas would be afraid to bite her.
If Bell’s wife was a car she’d be a twenty-year-old banger
with a possible oil leak and dodgy brakes.
The DCI was a capricious man, who had the square head and
shoulders of a rampaging bull – and the temperament to match.
Eric Adamson didn’t so much have a chip on his shoulder,
but the whole potato field.
Tony made the kind of face only a gargoyle sculptor would
appreciate…
My Review:
I was quickly immersed and held enthrall with rapt attention
by Mr. Smith’s gripping tale and evocative writing. His uniquely peculiar characters were as compelling as his cunningly
crafted and well-honed storylines. I
relished and eagerly anticipated his clever introductions and amusingly colorful
descriptions of each character, which I tended to pause over and savor, as they
never failed to call forth a full visual such as, “His comb-over reached from ear to
ear and a small bloodstain decorated one of his chins where a razor had nicked
the skin.”
There were several intriguing
and tautly written storylines which pull me so deeply into their vortex that I started
hearing their different voices with accents, and I couldn’t wait to see how each
of the complex threads was going to intertwine. The Cumbria Major Crimes police unit was staffed by a group of quirky,
complex, and multi-layered personalities with complicated relationships
existing between them. Intricate deceptions
were everywhere. This was a superbly
written first-rate mystery and I loved every confounding puzzle piece and came
away quite satisfied with the stimulating entertainment.
Empress DJ
About Graham Smith
Graham Smith is a time served joiner who has built bridges, houses, dug drains and slated roofs to make ends meet. Since Christmas 2000, he has been the manager of a busy hotel and wedding venue near Gretna Green, Scotland.
He is an internationally best-selling Kindle author and has four books featuring DI Harry Evans and the Cumbrian Major Crimes Team, and three novels, featuring Utah doorman, Jake Boulder.
An avid fan of crime fiction since being given one of Enid Blyton’s Famous Five books at the age of eight, he has also been a regular reviewer and interviewer for the well-respected website Crimesquad.com since 2009
Graham is the founder of Crime and Publishment, a weekend of crime-writing classes which includes the chance for attendees to pitch their novels to agents and publishers. Since the first weekend in 2013, eight attendees have gone on to sign publishing contracts.
Graham can be found at
https://www.facebook.com/grahamnsmithauthor
https://twitter.com/GrahamSmith1972
Website
www.grahamsmithauthor.com
Giveaway
To celebrate the release of When the Waters Recede, Graham Smith is offering one lucky reader the chance to win all six books in the Harry Evans series.
To enter, simply sign up for his newsletter via the link provided before the 5th of June 2018 and you’ll be entered into not just this competition, but all competitions that he runs. Entrants from the whole world are welcome.
To enter, simply sign up for his newsletter via the link provided before the 5th of June 2018 and you’ll be entered into not just this competition, but all competitions that he runs. Entrants from the whole world are welcome.
5 stars from DJ than it must be spectacular!
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like such an intense mystery! Glad to hear you've added new words to your Brit vocabulary!
ReplyDeleteGlad you enjoyed it too.
ReplyDelete