#TeamDaniels #BlogTour ‘The Murder Wall’ by Mari Hannah

About the book…

 It’s where you look death in the face.

Months after discovering a double homicide in a sleepy village, detective Kate Daniels is still haunted by her failure to solve the crime.

When a new murder gives Daniels her first case as officer in charge, she jumps at another chance to get it right. But even more shocking than the brutal killing is the fact that Daniels recognizes the corpse.

Eager to prove herself, she decides to keep her connection to the dead man a secret from her team, putting her career in jeopardy as her personal and professional lives threaten to collide.

As the killer continues to claim his victims, Daniels unearths baffling clues in her search for connections among the murders . . . and while she draws closer to finding the culprit, he is watching her.

My thanks to Tracy of Compulsive Readers and publishers, Orion, for inviting me to be a part of #TeamDaniels, a re-read of the Kate Daniels novels starting with ‘The Murder Wall’

Running to keep us as quickly as I can with #TeamDaniels, I am a little behind but hello! Here are my thoughts on ‘Murder Wall’, Kate Daniels first outing. I joined the series later on and so my perception of her is a little different as this is set in 2008, and this is the first major case she has handled.

Its funny, retconning the books you read and trying to see it totally fresh because we know where certain characters arcs go, but here, Kate arrives fully formed as a woman in a patriarchal organisation that despises women openly in some cases, and even more those women who are queer.

She carries with her the murders that she herself discovered almost a year earlier, in her church, that remain unsolved so from the start we see her as someone with integrity, staying power and stubbornness who refuses to give up.

However, this will push each and every button as well as  crossing over into her personal life , she has higher ups (ACC level) waiting for her to stumble and be replaced by another man, so when she attends a shooting, and the suspect has a close and personal connection, not only is her career in jeopardy, so is the investigation and her personal life.

And as circumstantial evidence mounts up to point the finger of blame directly at her friend and colleague, Jo Soulsby, help comes from an unexpected quarter….a murderer.

This is a fantastic book, I had to read it slowly and carefully to make sure I got the gist of who was who and where they fit together in the team dynamic, and their allegiances . I bloody love Kate and her fierce dedication to her job but god alive I wish she gave herself a break on occasion, she genuinely is so hard on herself that any friendships and loyalties are stretched.

Her instincts are killer and she quickly suspects a serial murderer is on the loose she merely has to work out his or her long game and how it can be proved to relate to the 2 inital killings which opened the book.

What  loved was how the murders are not graphic or gratuitous, they are dealt with in a non-exploitative way where justice for the victims is the driving force. You get a glimpse of how difficult it is that the force cannot completely divorce themselves from the crimes committed and their own personal lives, the impact of trauma is sensitively portrayed , as is the issue of ‘tolerance’, ( and that word is deliberately used to highlight one of the most moving paragraphs in the book, in my humble opinion).

I mentioned I had to read slowly in order to savour the details and make sure I was paying full attention , as when the brown stuff hits the spinny thing, you heart is absolutely in your mouth willing Kate on to success.

Loved it, loved it, loved it, this is a fantastic opener for a series which will run and run, and I loved the nostalgia it gave me for my errant teen years at Newcastle Uni…happy days!

About the author…

When an injury on duty ended my career as Probation Officer, I began writing. I am the author of the Kate Daniels and Ryan & O’Neil series published by Pan Macmillan and the Stone & Oliver series published by Orion. My debut, ‘The Murder Wall’, was written as a TV pilot for a BBC Drama Development Scheme – before the adaption.

The novel won the Polari First Book Prize. Before becoming an author, I fell in love with scriptwriting and submitted speculative original dramas to the BBC Writersroom. I’ve also written a romantic comedy feature film that I hope will find a producer one day. In 2010, I won the Northern Writers’ Award for my second novel, ‘Settled Blood’.

And in 2017, I won the Dagger in the Library for my body of work. I’m represented by AM Heath literary agent, Oli Munson, and live in Northumberland with my partner, a former murder detective.

Twitter @mariwriter  @DCIKateDaniels @OrionBooks @Tr4cyF3nt0n

Links-http://www.marihannah.com/news/author/marihannah