ARC Review: Pop Goes the Weasel (Helen Grace book 2)

Title: Pop Goes the Weasel: A Detective Helen Grace Thriller (A Helen Grace Thriller) by MJ Alridge
Publisher: Penguin Group
Format: advanced e-copy was received from the publisher through netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review
Pages: 416 pages
Genre: Mystery Thriller

This title is due to be released October 6, 2015

Synopsis: A man's body is found in an empty house. 
A gruesome memento of his murder is sent to his wife and children.

He is the first victim, and Detective Helen Grace knows he will not be the last. But why would a happily married man be this far from home in the dead of night?

The media call it Jack the Ripper in reverse: a serial killer preying on family men who lead hidden double lives.

Helen can sense the fury behind the murders. But what she cannot possibly predict is how volatile this killer is—or what is waiting for her at the end of the chase....

Review: Detective Helen Grace and her co-worker Charlie are still struggling to get back on their feet after what happened at the end of book 1.  Now with a new boss, who seems to want to take all the glory but not actually do any work her team is faced with a new challenge.  Men are being murdered and their hearts are being sent to their families. With her team falling apart, her boss doing everything she can to remove her from the case and the reporter who seems to know her every move, DI Grace is running out of time to solve this case.

Since I read a galley copy of this book I am assuming some of my issues will be solved when it is published but there were transition issues from one character to the next where I found myself confused. Paragraphs ran together leaving me having to go back and figure out whose story I was reading and this was distracting.   Despite this I found that I enjoyed this book more than I did Eeney Meeney, book 1 of this series.  I'm finding the development of DI Grace to be intriguing and it will be interesting to see how some of the other main characters either evolve or disappear in coming books.

All in all this is a good suspensful mystery thriller.  Chapters are short which keeps the book moving and you turning the pages.  The next book in this series is due out in the US in February 2016 and I find that I'm actually anxiously awaiting it. I hope this series just continues to improve.




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