'The Train Rider' Darian Richards #3 by Tony Cavanaugh

Received from the Publisher

From the BLURB:

One man pushed Darian Richards to the edge. The man he couldn't catch. The Train Rider.

As Victoria's top homicide investigator, Darian Richards spent years catching killers. The crimes of passion, of anger, of revenge ... they were easy. It was the monsters who were hard.

Someone was taking girls. At first he'd keep them a week then give them back. Darian warned that wouldn't last. It didn't. From then on, their bodies were never found. Girls kept disappearing. All they had in common was the fact they d last been seen on a train.

The ever-rising list of the vanished broke Darian. Forced him to walk away. Now, retired, watching the Noosa River flow by, the nightmares had finally stopped. Darian was never going back.

Then three girls go missing from Queensland trains. Darian knows that the killer is playing him. He has a choice to make. But when the decision means a girl will die, there is no choice. He has to stop this man once and for all. Forever.

He’s back. The man, the murderer, who forced Melbourne’s best homicide detective off the force and into the quiet serenity of Noosa in Queensland. The Train Rider abducts girls from train carriages – in the beginning he raped and tortured them, then dressed them in the rags of his previous victims and abandoned them in parking garages for the police to find. And then he stopped giving the girls back; they just started disappearing, dead and buried somewhere unknown. 

Melbourne’s top cop, Darian Richards pursued the Train Rider for years, with no success. Until he finally threw in the towel – turned his back on the case and the force.

But now he’s back, having followed Darian to Queensland. Girls have started going missing, from trains. And Darian gets a visit from the local priest who says he’s heard a murderer’s confession.

The Train Rider is back – and he wants Darian to play.

‘The Train Rider’ is the third book in Tony Cavanaugh’s ‘Darian Richards’ crime series.

I really, truly hope this isn’t the last Darian Richards book in Tony Cavanaugh’s gripping-gruesome crime series. Since first book ‘Promise’, when we first met Darian and learnt that he was plagued by his failure to find the Train Rider serial killer operating out of Melbourne, this third book has been the pinnacle of the series. The one in which Darian is forced to once again confront the one that got away. 

There is a lot in this book that sets up a longer-haul for Darian. Like his reconnecting with escort-turned-love-interest, Rose, who Darian used as bait to catch serial killer Winston Promise and whom he finally apologises to and woos back in ‘The Train Rider’. Darian, a self-proclaimed loner with a disastrous romantic track-record peppered mainly with prostitutes, lays his heart on his sleeve for Rose and raises the stakes for himself by making an emotional promise to her that’s linked to finding the elusive Train Rider. 

Then there’s his erstwhile ‘partner’, local policewoman Maria who helped Darian on his last two forays back into the world of homicide and who is dating his only friend, Casey, a 50-something retired criminal also living in the secluded North. Maria has been a focus in the series since reluctantly partnering with Darian and having her moral fibre come under scrutiny for helping in his vigilante justice campaigns. But she’s a tricky character in herself – and I would like to spend more time with her in the series. In ‘The Train Rider’ she’s lured into Darian’s “game” with the serial killer, and she’s experiencing serious doubts about her unlikely relationship with Casey, while also wondering if there is something to Darian’s own form of justice. 

There are plenty of loose ends and open-ended relationships in ‘The Train Rider’ that I hope means this isn’t the last we’ve seen of Darian Richards. The Dashiell Hammett-type cop who spouts deeply cynical zingers like; 

Nostalgia for me is like God: of no use.

It’s also wonderful that in this book Darian returns to his old Melbourne stomping ground. This setting is particularly fruitful for Cavanaugh’s noir-ish observations; 

Melbourne was a city of murder. That was the only way I could see it as the night pushed down on me.  

It was so great to be back. 

I also hope this isn’t the last we see of Darian for Maria’s sake. In this book in particular she’s given even more of a murky moral compass, and I can really see her holding her own if more books are planned. She has a really keen eye and a disgruntled spirit that I think has a lot more to offer this series; 

… male cops tended to follow the laws of being a tough guy set out by John Wayne and Clint Eastwood in the middle of a canyon, on a horse, in the 1850s. Somehow that image, from countless movies, set the role for cops in Queensland – all over the country, really – in the second decade of the twentieth century. In fact, for as long as she could remember. Maybe, she thought, the solo warrior with a rifle by his side and a horse below him, bathed in a harsh sun and squinting at dangers far away, was the image to aspire to for men in general. 

Like with the other books in the ‘Darian Richards’ series, we’re given a first-person narrative glimpse into the serial killer’s mind. It’s depraved, as usual. As is the grotesque murder-spree the Train Rider conducts. But one thing I thought was missing from ‘The Train Rider’ was mention of a serious ethical over-step Darian mentioned back in first book ‘Promise’. Part of the reason he retired from the force and turned his back on the Train Rider investigation in Melbourne was a broken promise he made to one of the victim’s mothers … who he then had a very close romantic encounter with. I remembered that little factoid about Darian (enough to make mention of it in my review at the time) and thought that the Train Rider’s reappearance in Darian’s new Queensland life would surely bring this indiscretion, and the woman, back to the fore. But she’s never mentioned and I found that to be an odd omission. 

This is a series full of machismo – and even while Darian chastises the redneck Queensland police officers he comes into contact with (particularly over their sexist treatment of Maria and women in general), Cavanaugh has written the two main women in Darian’s life with a misogynistic eye. Rose and Maria are young (20-something) bombshells with tiny waists, long legs and big boobs. Rose was the escort Darian started to fall for over a year of Tuesday meetings, and in the ultimate far-fetched daydream, Rose started to fall for Darian in return. She walks around like a middle-aged man’s wet-dream come to life: in Black Sabbath tank and white short-shorts. 

And since Maria helped find serial killer Winston Promise in a previous book she’s been given the nickname ‘Glamour Cop’ by her colleagues and her live-in partner, Casey, jokes that Playboy will come calling with the hopes that she’ll pose with a Glock between her breasts. Darian’s tech-man Isosceles has a serious Raquel Welch obsession, and for Maria’s resemblance he has developed a puppy-love crush on her. 

I actually found Rose to be quite boring – she really does read like a cardboard cut-out male fantasy and even with serious trauma now in her past (thanks to Darian) she’s nothing more than a vessel for his ardour, rather than an actual human-being. Maria, on the other hand, I find fascinating. She doesn’t seem to pay much attention to what she looks like, regardless of how much Darian and Isosceles make of her appearance. Rather, Maria has real conflict as a straight-laced cop who is becoming somewhat seduced by Darian’s vigilante justice. 

Then there are the other women Cavanaugh portrays – the victims. As they’ve been in the past two books, in ‘The Train Rider’ they are once again young and beautiful girls falling prey to the sick machinations of a serial killer. At one point in flashback to the Melbourne Train Rider case, one of Darian’s officers on the taskforce observes that the only thing connecting all these victims is their attractive appearance, to which Isosceles quips; “Well, he’s not going to take an ugly one.” Even the female victims in this series are treated like pretty props for male fantasy. Interestingly enough, the day I finished reading ‘The Train Rider’ I read an article that said actor Helen Mirren criticized the increasing number of TV murder victims who are young women as part of her Bafta honour speech. The same could probably be said for the female kill-rate (often linked with sexual depravity) in crime novels. 

I do enjoy this series, testosterone-fuelled it may be and with a problem in its portrayal of women. But I like Darian, and I’m fascinated by Maria. In this third book I can see real longevity for the series, and I’m crossing my fingers that it won’t be long before I can read another complex case headed by Darian Richards.

4/5 

'Dead Girl Sing' Darian Richards #2 by Tony Cavanaugh

From the BLURB:

Darian Richards knew he should have let the phone keep ringing. But more than two decades as a cop leaves you with a certain outlook on life. No matter how much he tried to walk away, something, or someone, kept bringing him back to his gun.

One phone call. Two dead girls in a shallow water grave. And a missing cop to deal with.
Something bad is happening on the Gold Coast glitter strip. Amongst the thousands of schoolies and the usual suspects, someone is preying on beautiful young women. No one has noticed. No one knows why.

Darian looked into the eyes of those two dead girls. The last person to do that was their killer. He can t walk away. He will find out why.

Maybe it’s a hero complex. Or that you never really take the uniform off for good. Hell, maybe it’s because Darian’s saved this girl once already, so what’s one more? Either way, the phone rang and Darian answered: ‘Darian, you must come. Only you can help. There are so many bodies– ’

That one phone call from Ida, the girl Darian saved from the Sunshine Coast killer a few months ago, has now dragged him into a new murder investigation . . . it involves a trip to the “hellfire inferno” Gold Coast, during schoolies week. When Darian starts looking for Ida, he finds two dead girls instead, and then a cop goes missing. 

Darian Richards retired from the police force, but when this new case drags him back into the fold he finds more to worry about than just the missing Ida . . . whatever this girl has gotten herself into, it involves disappearing University students, sex slavery and international kidnapping.

With the (reluctant) help of Noosa cop, Maria, computer genius Isosceles and a notorious con called Blonde Richard; Darian is going to get himself mired in yet another grisly case, once again proving that while he may be done with the police force, the force ain’t done with him. 

‘Dead Girl Sing’ is the second book in Australian author, Tony Cavanaugh’s crime-thriller series, ‘Darian Richards.’ 

I loved Cavanaugh’s debut, ‘Promise’, and I’m thrilled that he has bought Darian Richards out for a second dance (with a third definitely on the horizon). I don’t get invested in many crime series; Karin Slaughter being my only other devout read. I tend to lose interest in crime series very quickly (which is why I don’t watch many crime series TV shows either). What I found though, that keeps me coming back, is terribly damaged characters. I don’t know what it is, but if there’s an underdog, grey-scale dubious anti-hero who I constantly flip between loving and loathing; then I’m there. I’m invested. I care. And there’s nobody more grey-scale than Darian Richards – an ex Melbourne detective who was rumoured to have a bad-guy kill-rate, but was also known to put crooked cops in their place (and in the ground). 

This is a guy who admits to never having had a successful relationship; he pays by the hour for his companionship and that’s all he needs. He moved to Noosa to be closer to his one and only ‘friend’, an ex-brothel owner called Casey. And Darian seems to have an unlimited number of favours owed to him by any number of criminals from all over Australia. But, for all his murky ethics and questionable past, Darian is smart. He first put on the uniform at age nineteen, and even in retirement it looks as though his blood will never run anything but blue. This is especially obvious when a single phone-call from a girl he saved in ‘Promise’ has him driving, helter-skelter, down to Brisbane and the Gold Coast . . . where he reluctantly uncovers dead bodies, a missing cop, disappearing co-eds and a sex slavery ring masterminded by one of the most chilling femme fatales I've ever read.

First: the Gold Coast setting is genius. Even more so for being set during the dreaded ‘schoolies’ week: when the recent high school graduates descend on this beachside city (sometimes called ‘Bris-Vegas’, for being Australia’s own big kids playground version of Las Vegas). Schoolies is full of drugs, alcohol, parties and hormonal teenagers doing anything and everything regrettable. Every year, without fail, schoolies week news-coverage involves stories of roofie rapes and teenagers falling to their death from hotel balconies. So this is the town and time of year that Darian is working in to uncover the murder mystery. And he’s trying to work alongside (or at least, not get in the crosshairs) of Q1, the #1 Queensland police station.

Something I love about Cavanaugh’s writing is that he has the intricacies of the Australian police scene well and truly sussed out. He writes about the force/service name change, the old grizzly detectives who’ve been in the game too long and in the case of the Queensland cops; he’s nailed their RayBan-wearing, muscle-bearing, nose-flaring inflated egos; 

I knew they’d be a different breed, different from the boys on the Noosa hill, back up on the Sunshine Coast. Up there it’s Japanese tourists and stoned rich kids. Little guys growing dope and drink-driving. It’s tourism crime. Down here, on the Gold Coast, it’s hardcore. It was sleepy and laid-back in 1954. Now it’s a hellfire inferno. The waves kept crashing against the beach and the corks keep popping; it is a tourist playground, after all, but there’s a rumble-fuck not far below the surface. Step back from the beach and you can feel it, hear it, see it. The cops more than meet the need. They’re known to show off their guns to teenage girls. They don’t mind a bit of jackboot.

Something I said about ‘Promise’ reveals itself in this follow-up, to be Cavanaugh’s particular crime-writing style; gore and violence. Maybe it’s obvious to point out that there’s violence in a crime novel – but having dabbled in a few now, I can safely say that some writers pull back and, compared to Cavanaugh, are downright conservative. But the ‘Darian Richards’ series goes to dark places that are sometimes very uncomfortable. And Cavanaugh only seems to write violence against women – so you can imagine the dark and vicious stories involved. And in ‘Dead Girl Sing’ we’re dealing with sex slavery; so it is harrowing. And as a woman reading this, there are times when I swallowed bile. But what makes ‘Dead Girl Sing’ even more uncomfortable is the fact that the ‘bad guy’ is actually a young woman . . . ‘Starlight’ is the name she gave herself, and she’s disgustingly ruthless. She came from the slums of Rio, slept her way to London and then fought her way to Australia. She’s young and stunning – drop dead gorgeous, in fact – but she’s taken the hard lessons she learned in the slums and has decided to never have to claw her way out of that life again. She intends to stay on top, and anyone she has to dispose and sell to stay there is just collateral damage.

In reading ‘Promise’ I wasn’t sure (but hoped) that it wouldn’t be a one-off book, but part of a series. In ‘Dead Girl Sing’, Cavanaugh leaves no doubt in the readers’ mind that Darian is a hero who could be here to stay for a good long while. We learn tiny morsels of his past, and the secondary characters who intrigued us in ‘Promise’ are back for round-two. Isosceles, the computer genius with a penchant for obscure historical factoids and no social skills, whatsoever, is again helping steer Darian’s investigation. And Maria is also returned; still harbouring resentment and guilt over what happened with the Sunshine Killer. 

Maria is, really, a stand-out for me. Admittedly, her and Darian’s dubious ‘partnership’ is a bit of a cliché; he, the handsome and wiser sceptical old pro; she the model-like rookie who’s eager but green. But she has potential that Cavanaugh constantly hints at. She’s dealing with sexism and the fact that her ideals of the police service are constantly butting heads with the reality. And in ‘Dead Girl Sing’ we actually get into Maria’s head and learn that she’s not as confident as she appears; 

Sometimes her lover, who she adored, spoke in the most obscure ways. This was one of those times. But she got the drift, nonetheless.  

‘You don’t understand,’ she said. 

‘What? Because you’re a cop and the bloke you talked to is also a cop? That clan thing? Yeah, babe, I understand that. You and this Dane Harper dude, all puttin’ on the uniform, all standin’ under the same flag, all workin’ to the same code . . . but you know it and I know it. Darian ain’t a cop, don’t wear no uniform, but baby, he is the man for good. And you know it.’ 

There’s a moment in ‘Dead Girl Sing’, when Darian muses on an old psychological test that the police forced used to insist on as part of application. It was the Milgram experiment – and it was designed to study the willingness of participants to obey an authority figure (even when obeying meant conflicting with their conscience). Darian actually refers to it more as a psychopath test – since the experiment involves inflicting pain on another human being, upon instruction of a ‘teacher.’ Some people find themselves incapable of hurting (and potentially killing) another human being – and would refuse to do the experiment, or at least show extreme remorse when they eventually caved and obeyed. For some, the experiment was simple. I think Cavanaugh has actually written his own version of a ‘psychopath test’ in the ending of ‘Dead Girl Sing’ . . .  for some, the conclusion will be a fitting end; comeuppances served, a form of justice upheld (however twisted). For others (and I’m one of them) the end will be a perversion in itself. I think it will be a test of each reader’s personal moral compass how they react to the ending and Darian’s bitter form of justice. I’ll admit that for some, the ending will skew the rest of the book (and possibly series?) they’ll second-guess if they ever want to read Darian Richards ever again. I think that’s okay – it lends itself to why I’m conflicted in my liking of the character, and enjoyment of the series – that beautiful grey area. 

For what it’s worth; I’m hooked. 

4/5

'Promise' Darian Richards #1 by Tony Cavanaugh

Received from the Publisher

From the BLURB:

Top Homicide cop Darian Richards has been seeking out monsters for too long. He has promised one too many victim's families he will find the answers they need and it's taken its toll. After surviving a gunshot wound to the head he calls it quits and retires to the Sunshine Coast in an attempt to leave the demons behind. But he should have realised, there are demons everywhere and no place is safe. A serial killer is prowling the Sunshine Coast area and Darian tries to ignore the fact his experience could make a difference hunting him down.

All he wants is to sit at the end of his jetty on the Noosa River and ignore the fact that girls from the area have vanished over the past fourteen months. All blonde and pretty. Youngest: 13. Oldest: 16. He knows they are all dead but the cops were saying 'missing' or 'vanished . That s what you have to say if you don t have a body.

Jenny Brown was the first. She vanished sometime after 4 in the afternoon, Saturday 15 October the previous year. Except for her parents and her friends and everybody who knew her, it was thought she was just a runaway. Especially by the cops who allowed a good two or three minutes before arriving at that conclusion. By the time they d reached the gate to the front yard of her house, before they d even walked across the road and climbed into their cruiser, they would ve forgotten Jenny Brown even existed.

But then others disappeared and they couldn t call them all runaways. Darian can t sit idly by and he decides he is going to find the killer and deal with him ... his way.

Darian Richards threw his service weapon into the ocean and walked away from his job as Australia’s more successful homicide detective. He has left Melbourne behind after failing to catch ‘the train killer’, and has settled in for retirement on Queensland’s Noosa River.

Darian spends the first few months enjoying his retirement and a certain notoriety in his new, small town. He has a similarly retired friend in Casey Lack, a fifty-something ex-brothel owner who also migrated from Melbourne, after his club was blown to high heaven. Then there’s Casey’s twenty-something girlfriend, Maria, a cop on the local force. Maria is beautiful and smart (as Darian believes all female officers are, far more than their male colleagues) but she doesn’t like Darian, partly because her station has ruffled feathers over the country’s top homicide detective moving on to their turf (retired or not).

And then girls start going missing . . .

Young girls, aged between 13 and 16, all with blonde hair have been reported missing. At first the local police were happy to write the disappearance of one girl off as a runaway case. . . but when more reports came in, with all the missing sharing similar physical descriptions, it was hard to ignore. And then the ‘trophies’ started showing up – the girl’s mobile phones, with disturbing photos loaded, leave little doubt that all of the missing are dead, and met violent ends.

Darian cannot ignore ‘Operation Blonde’ for a minute longer. The local police are showing a disturbing level of incompetence, and in once case cover-up, and he is compelled to reach for his gun once again.

‘Promise’ is the debut Australian crime fiction novel from Tony Cavanaugh.

This is a highly-anticipated novel. Tony Cavanaugh has quite a resume – he’s a writer and film/television producer (having worked on shows like ‘The Sullivans’ and ‘Carson’s Law’). He was also nominated for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for the screenplay ‘Father’ and the Queensland Premier’s Literary Award for the screenplay ‘Through My Eyes’. ‘Promise’ is his debut novel, and with a writing resume that stellar it is riding on high expectations . . . and meets them, in my opinion.

A few years ago Scottish crime writer, Ian Rankin, made the explosive statement that "the people writing the most graphic violence today are women ... they are mostly lesbians as well". Backlash ensued. But I would say that if Rankin were to read Tony Cavanaugh’s debut novel, he might just eat his words.

‘Promise’ is a difficult read. Cavanaugh has written a bloody and masochistically violent killer, and he vividly documents the abuse of the missing girls in stomach-churning detail. The detail is especially overwhelming because parts of the book are told from the killer’s point of view (interspersed with Darian’s). That’s right, from the get-go readers know who the killer is; he calls himself ‘Winnie’ and it becomes quickly apparent that he is warped and caught somewhere between man and child; he’ll rank his favourite Disney movies in one sentence, and then go cut into his latest victim. The story becomes a cat and mouse game, as we read Darian close in on the killer, while also simultaneously subjected to the madman’s thoughts, his creepily personal addresses to the reader (“brothers and sisters”, as though he knows he has an audience) and then we read his torture, rape and eventual killing of his young female victims. It is supremely unsettling, akin to reading Patrick Bateman’s first-person lunacy in ‘American Psycho’.

Winnie’s descriptions of his outbursts, sexual assaults and violent rapes are horridly vivid and hard to get through. But what is also creepy is his step-by-step ‘instruction’ on how to kidnap ‘prey’. He speaks, at length, about how much he loves shopping centres; in particular, he adores shops like SUPRÉ and Sportsgirl, where he can pick his next victim, perhaps catch a glimpse of them in the change-rooms. . . As a female reader, I found the lead-up to Winnie’s violence utterly terrifying, because there’s no doubt in my mind that Cavanaugh has done research into how predators work – and it’s horrifying to think how simple it is to be caught in some lunatics’ crosshairs.

So, in that sense, ‘Promise’ is extremely unsettling. But at the same time, the violence and grotesqueness of Winnie’s POV did add to the tension. I can’t deny that it was damn good storytelling, no matter how disturbing.

I’m not sure if ‘Promise’ is the first in an ongoing series with Darian Richards, but I hope so. Because Darian is a very interesting ex-cop. For one thing, he’s extremely smart. Cavanaugh places a lot of emphasis on Darian having been the top homicide detective in Victoria – with a kill-rate and arrest record that had him being courted by other states to clean up dragging cases and nagging cold cases. And I, for one, completely believed that Darian was that good. He receives some geeky tech-support help from a friend back in Melbourne called Isosceles (by all accounts a brilliant recluse) but for the most part Darian relies on his own wits throughout the investigation.

Darian is by no means an ‘ordinary’ cop – this job has got under his skin and it will never leave him. Darian’s unique brilliance comes to focus in strange little paragraphs and asides. Like when he recounts the history of guns; that his preferred Beretta company goes back to 1526 and the Italian Wars, while the Smith & Wesson is from 1852 (coinciding with the American Civil War) and the Glock is a product of the 60’s (and the Vietnam War). When he comes face-to-face with the more archaic and ‘Neanderthal’ attitudes of the local Queensland police force, he puts those deadbeat cops in their place (either with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the rule book, or physical force). Darian has been in the force since he was nineteen-years-old; and in his many years he has collected insights into the cop psyche that are Raymond Chandler-esque for their accuracy;

Cops have this thing about loyalty. When a cop puts on a uniform, it’s like they’ve just departed the human race and joined another clan. I used to be like that. You think you’re different and, in truth, you are. You think your loyalty is to your fellow officers but it’s not. It’s to the victims. Sometimes it takes a little while for a cop to discover that. Sometimes a cop won’t ever discover it.

That’s not to say that Darian doesn’t have his faults as a protagonist. He is fascinating for his brilliance, but certainly lacking a more substantial warmth and, possibly, long-lasting interest. Darian is a solitary being, and by no means perfect. He admitted to being an alcoholic at one stage in his career. Part of the reason he decided to retire to Noosa was because of a broken promise to a victim’s mother, and the near-miss ethical over-the-line he almost had with that same mother. Darian doesn’t do relationships – but he’s not the womanizing archetypal cop so prevalent in the genre. Instead he prefers the once-a-week company of a young escort, who he ‘quietly loves’, but only needs human contact in small doses. At one point he reveals that his father abandoned the family when Darian was ten, to go and live in Thailand. But personal insights like that are far and few between, and I did wish that as a reader I had more of a human connection to Darian, more understanding of what makes him tick and future interesting human entanglements.

The more interesting character, really, is Maria who becomes a sort-of sidekick for Darian. Maria is young, and for her the sheen of the badge hasn’t quite worn off. But over the course of ‘Operation Blonde’ she starts having nightmares, and begins to understand the inherent evil in some people . . . even more disturbing for Maria is the realization that her fellow cops are not perfect, that they do not have the same integrity as she does (particularly where female victims are concerned). Darian is not surprised, since he maintains that female cops are always smarter. But for Maria, circumstances and damning evidence lead her down a dark path;

‘Guys and their dicks,’ she said. ‘Eighty-five per cent of violent crime comes from guys and their dicks.’

Something else I really loved about ‘Promise’ was how Tony Cavanaugh peppered the story with interesting insights and factoids about Australian police history, the most interesting of which concerned females in the force. For example, Darian (again, showing his mettle as an above-average cop) mentions that the first female police officers in Queensland were Ellen O’Donnell and Zara Dane, who joined in 1931, but “throughout their lifetime careers on the force, they were never sworn in.” One of the most fascinating (and disturbing) factoids was about Lorelle Saunders, who in 1984 became the first woman to become a detective in Queensland – only to have her fellow officers charge her with conspiracy to murder a fellow cop (her lover), “a charge of which she was innocent”, but still spent ten harrowing months in prison for. Thanks to Cavanaugh, I went away and researched these juicy morsels of history.

All in all, ‘Promise’ is a fascinating and unsettling read. I welcome Tony Cavanaugh as a startling new voice in the genre, and hope that he intends to write more books for his unique ex-cop character, Darian Richards. Gruesome it may be, but ‘Promise’ is also a deliciously hair-raising thriller to keep readers hooked until the very last sentence. . .

4/5