#BlogTour ‘The Killing Kind’ by Jane Casey

About the book..

He tells you you’re special…
As a barrister, Ingrid Lewis is used to dealing with tricky clients, but no one has ever come close to John Webster. After Ingrid defended Webster against a stalking charge, he then turned on her – following her, ruining her relationship, even destroying her home.

He tells you he wants to protect you…
Now, Ingrid believes she has finally escaped his clutches. But when one of her colleagues is run down on a busy London road, Ingrid is sure she was the intended victim. And then Webster shows up at her door…

But can you believe him?
Webster claims Ingrid is in danger – and that only he can protect her. Stalker or saviour? Murderer or protector? The clock is ticking for Ingrid to decide. Because the killer is ready to strike again.

Thank you to me, for having the excellent sense to be with the Maeve Kerrigan squad since the early days, and buying a copy of ‘The Killing Kind’ by Jane Casey, so that when the remarkable Anne Cater,( Random Things Host Extraordinaire) asks you if you want to be on the tour, your answer is a whoop, a hell yes, and I got my own copy please and thanking you!

My first thoughts on reading the synopsis was ‘Wait, where’s Maeve?’

My second thoughts were ‘It’s a Jane Casey novel, it’s going to be stellar anyhow…’

My third thoughts after reading the first chapter ‘She only gone and blew the bloody doors off! What the hell did I just read?!’

Let me tell you now, if you love the Maeve Kerrigan series then we can all go back and re-read them, lucky us, but even luckier, we get this searing indictment of what it actually means to be involved in the criminal justice system as well as seeing how it works-and what happens when it doesn’t.

And it all comes down to whether or not we take the evidence of a woman’s experiences seriously or not.

Ingrid is a compelling character-she has a job that she loves, it doesn’t make her a great deal of money but she feels she is working hard and serving a bigger cause. You sense there is a back story, but at the beginning, you are just getting to know her when she is knocked, quite literally , off her feet.

Something she was involved in, as a barrister a few years earlier, resulted in a successful quashing of a stalking case. But then, the stalker came for her.

Is he back now that his restraining order has run its course?

And was it even him in the first place who was making Ingrid’s life a pure hell?

Reading the transcripts, the interviews, the logging of all the harrassing behaviour, down in black and white is honestly terrifying because it looks so banal-multiple texts, ringing the phone at odd hours, a broken car mirror-and ultimately can be explained away.

But when you realise the absolute malevolence which someone would have to hold within themselves, day in and day out, in order to carry out such despicable actions that leave a woman on the edge of her sanity, then that is truly chilling.

And a part of you wonders, did she deserve it, becoming the object of his stalking -if indeed she is, I really want to avoid any spoilers in the hopes that people will pick up the newly released paperback of The Killing Kind-because she was so successful in her job .

Therein lies the rub-she does her job so well, that the woman accusing her client of stalking her, was tied up in knots by Ingrid’s questioning. Believing the innocence or guilt of the client is not the issue-the arguing of the case in court has to be unequivocal , unemotional and legally correct.

But within that legal argument, there is the lack of manoeuvrability which comes with an emotional crime such as stalking. How can a man reduce a woman to absolute madness and walk away the victor? The pure wave of anger at the way in which this woman was made small, insignificant made this reader see red.

The way in which the story is told from Ingrid’s first person narrative, and then third party reports and articles gives this thriller a very rounded feel and intensifies the  suspenseful nature of the story as Ingrid tries desperately to convince the police that the small act of lending a colleague an umbrella, led to death by mistaken identity.

You feel how she is trapped by the small acts of stalking which escalate to the point that she no longer feels safe in her own home. You are genuinely worried for her safety and are frustrated at the lack of understanding that those around her, within and without the law enforcement field , have towards the situation as it escalates to a deadly level.

It is the mark of a consummate professional that Jane Casey can out you inside this perilous perspective and  not use it as exploitative , or self aggrandising fiction. She doesn’t need to, the evidence is plain on the page and the underlying sadness of Ingrid’s situation is clearly evident on the pages of newspapers and the social media headlines.

We keep saying ‘this can never happen again‘ but until we start listening, really listening to what people are saying when they are being harrassed and stalked, then nothing will really change. We will still say , ‘what were they thinking when they did x, y or z’ rather than asking how we can stop the aggressors being able to do x, y and z, then we will never be able to admit there is a huge problem in the social and legal and judicial fields when  it comes to stalking.

A brilliant novel that will have you trying to remember to breathe whilst you are reading it, and cursing every loo break, every phone call that pulls you away from Ingrid, Jane Casey has done it again. A masterful novel which comes highly recommended, but be warned, this is a one stop till you finish it read!

About the author…

Jane Casey was born and brought up in Dublin. She then studied English at Jesus College, Oxford, followed by an mPhil in Anglo-Irish Literature at Trinity College, Dublin. Married to a criminal barrister, she lives in London and works in publishing as a children’s books editor.

Links-http://www.maevekerrigan.co.uk/#

Twitter @JaneCaseyAuthor

     @HarperCollinsUK