Gabrielle Lord

The vanishing is the first in the 48 hours series focusing on Jazz and Phoenix who try and solve the crimes. The book is a modern YA young adult mystery/crime novel with no smut whatsoever.
Jazz's best friend Anika disappears and she must team up with Phoenix to save Anika and find out why she was taken. The book was somewhat predictable but the endearing characters made it a fun read. I wish there was an app like Crime Seen in real life.
The book also features enemies to friends with Jazz and Phoenix displaying this trope.
… (mais)

Good Juvenile fiction series (12 Conspiracy books and 2 follow-ups). Would engage young readers into wanting to get to the next one.On New Year's Eve the main character Cal is chased down the street by a staggering, sick man who warns him that 'they' killed his father, they were going to kill him, and that he must survive the next 365 days.... The first one has 15 year-old Callum his days filled with storms, sharks, Parks, the thick weave of sacks covering his face, an angel, a crazy man, a cemetery vault, lifeless bodies, hidden drawings, and clues left by a dead father. He is being chased by good guys and bad guys alike and that is just January. 11 months to go.… (mais)

Set in Sydney, Australia, Death by Beauty is a reasonable crime novel slash mystery thriller. It's the 5th in the series but there's enough back story so that reading this as a stand alone I really didn't feel I was missing anything character wise.

What is does seem to be missing though is that factor that takes a book from okay to good, the elements are there but the way the story comes together is just a tad too predictable and the trope of the working woman balancing attractive ex-partner with attentive and caring current partner really didn't do much for my reading experience.

At any rate, it's reasonable, it will fill in some time even if you can see whose responsible coming form a mile away.… (mais)

While there is plenty of mystery in this story, it is not crime fiction.

Greta's husband Magnus tells her that he has arranged a holiday for them on the French Riviera and almost immediately two things happen which throw those plans aside. First of all her mother, in the last stage of Alzheimers' dies; and then a postcard arrives telling her that her sister Xanthe who has been in Crete for three years is missing. Immmediately after her mother's funeral Greta flies out to Crete to look for her sister.

Almost immediately things back in Australia go awry. Magnus' career as Assistant Police Commissioner in New South Wales goes into jeopardy, he is unable to cope with his teenage daughter and young son, and Greta's publisher wants her next script.

In Crete Greta manages to find out what the police know about her sister's disappearance and she starts to look for clues about where she might be. On the phone from Australia her husband Magnus becomes increasingly angry and at the same time very distant.

So this is a mystery rather than crime fiction. I found it a difficult read sometimes, a bit too philosophical, and several times was on the verge of giving up.

In March this year Gabrielle Lord wrote
Sisters is finally making its way into the shops. It's been a long process, held up by unforeseen circumstances but now I'm hoping it goes out into the world and is well received. This is the worry time for writers. Will people like it? Will it be well reviewed? Will it sell? I'm hopeful that such a good story, well-researched --I lived in Crete for months in the northwest town of Kissamos where the story is set in order to get things right -- well, as right as a non-resident is able, with strong characters, facing difficult choices and often in some danger, create a novel which has been described as 'unputdownable'. Wilkinson publishing has been very supportive (thank you Jess!) and although it's been a 'difficult birth', the result makes me happy. I hope it'll bring the same satisfaction to all my readers.

I think maybe it was the depth of research that got in the way of my enjoyment. At times it read like a travelogue. But read it for yourself.… (mais)