Today I’m joining the blog tour for The Family Secret. My review is written with thanks to the team at Bookouture for inviting me on the tour and for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

Deflated balloons on the floor. Sandwiches curling on plates. The evidence of a normal birthday party a shocking contrast to the bodies of the mother and her twelve-year-old daughter lying on their beds, their secret taken to the grave…

When Detective Lottie Parker arrives at the devastating scene the day after Freya Healey’s birthday party, a wave of sorrow overcomes her. Holding Freya’s cold white hand, she vows to find justice for her and her parents lying dead in the next room, killed just after the last guest had gone.

Determined to solve this terrible crime, Lottie rushes to interview the party guests, including Freya’s best friend Lily. Shy and tearful, the little girl is unwilling to talk about Freya and her parents, at least in front of her over-protective mother. But when her mother reveals that Lily changed her mind about sleeping over at the Healeys at the last minute on the night they were killed, she feels certain that she is hiding something crucial…

The next morning, she is shocked to receive a phone call from Lily’s terrified mother. Lily has been stolen from her home – could the Healey family secret have something to do with her disappearance?

Digging deeper, desperate for answers, Lottie discovers a connection between Lily’s father and Freya’s mother that chills her to the bone. Do both families hide dark secrets? What evidence can she trust and who is lying to her? And can she find the truth before another innocent little girl is lost forever?

A totally addictive page-turner from bestselling author Patricia Gibney. If you like Rachel McLean, Kendra Elliott and Robert Dugoni, After the Party will have you hooked.

Review:

It feels like a while since the last Lottie Parker release and boy, am I glad she is back! Lottie and her team are a wonderful group of characters and after sixteen novels, they feel like family. I’ve loved reading as the characters have developed, both personally and professionally. There is a darker element to the team in this novel and it’s one that feels relevant in the light of recent news stories and I’m looking forward to seeing how this part of the plot continues. 

The Family Secret is set in the fictional town of Ragmullin in Ireland, and I love how Patricia Gibney has built this over the series so that, despite it being fictional, it is very easy to picture and draw a picture in the reader’s minds of the locations that the detectives are visiting. I listened to the audio version of the book, and the narrator’s gentle Irish accent also helped to transport me to the setting. 

Patricia Gibney is an amazing plotter. Each of the investigations in this series have a long list of suspects with complex connections between them and The Family Secret is no different. It makes for an engaging novel that was difficult to turn away from. Each of the suspects has some dark secrets and I really wanted to know what they were hiding.

I hope Lottie Parker and her team are back soon

The Family Secret is available from Amazon.