"The Longest Goodbye" by Mari Hannah, a review.
For my book club this month, the theme is crime novels, so imagine my delight when I realised that there was a new Mari Hannah book out and it was the latest in the DCI Kate Daniels series. "The Longest Goodbye" is the 9th in the series and here is my review.
I first discovered Mari Hannah's books when my friend Jo-G suggested them, I love a good crime thriller and I was looking for a new series to bury my head in. I picked up "The Murder Wall" and that was that, I was hooked. I was in the fortunate position that the first book was written in 2010 and I didn't start reading them until 2021, so I had 7 to work my way through.
There's been a 2 year wait between book 8, "Her Last Request" and the latest"The Longest Goodbye", but it was worth the wait!
"The Longest Goodbye" starts with a flashback to 3 years earlier when Kate finds out that her close friend and fellow police officer Georgina Ioannau has been murdered. Despite being pretty sure who was responsible, the killers were never bought to justice.
Back in the present day and the prime suspects, the sons of a local crime godmother are back in the UK. Just hours after they arrive back in Newcastle, they are shot dead. The police believe it's a revenge killing.
Kate re-investigates the case and is forced to deal with the mistakes that other officers have made in the past as well as her own, plus she has to look after her team and not screw up her career or theirs.
I've not been very well all week and rather than take the opportunity to watch back to back episodes of "90 Day Fiancee", I curled up in my favourite armchair with a cup of tea, the fire on and read. "The Longest Goodbye" hurtles along at quite the pace, the story is intriguing and there are lots of twists and turns along the way and the ending did not disappoint.
One of the things I love most about Mari Hannah is how she has developed the characters over the series. I love Kate, Hank and Lisa. I think Ailsha has been a great addition and I am fully invested in the relationship between Kate and Jo. Whilst you could enjoy this as a standalone, I think you'd miss out on the joy of getting to know the characters, Mari has a way of getting you to really care about them.
I'd give "The Longest Goodbye" 8.5 out of 10.
No pressure Mari, but I'm ready for book 10!
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