Heartbreaking #Detective #MurderMystery – The Little Grave by Carolyn Arnold

Title: The Little Grave

Series: Detective Amanda Steele #1

Author: Carolyn Arnold

Publisher: Bookouture

Publish Date: 11 Jan 2021

Pages: 339

Rating: 3.5/5*

 

My Review:

Gosh this is a heartbreaking read . . . it really should come with a warning concerning how emotional it is. Five years ago Detective Amanda Steele’s lost her husband, their daughter and their unborn child when a drunk driver hit their car. She’s still grief stricken and was devastated when the perpetrator was released from prison a few days ago. When she hears that his body has been found in a motel bedroom, she can’t resist going and coercing her sergeant into letting her be involved in the investigation,

This is a page-turner that is filled with grief, but is also a story of someone reconnecting with life to help save others. It is a story of someone effectively locking themselves away from anything that might make them feel again, going through the motions of life but not really living. However, this case triggers so much for Amanda, making her work with a partner is something she resents and she certainly shows it – she’s awful to him at times. She still prefers being a loner, shutting everyone else out, including her parents and family. As she investigates the perpetrator’s death, though, she finds evidence to connect him to other cold cases, cases involving other deaths, unwittingly putting herself into deadly danger as she seeks to bring another killer to justice.

Don’t read this if you’re feeling sad and looking for something to cheer you up but don’t miss it if you’re looking for a dramatic, emotive murder mystery complete with an off the wall twist at the end! It is a real page turner but the amount of grief expressed makes it such a depressing read. However, it is still an intriguing read, filled with surprising twists and turns and I suspect I’ll enjoy future books in this series much more!

Thank you to Bookouture and NetGalley for my copy of this book which I have voluntarily read and honestly reviewed.

Synopsis:

Amanda stops just inside the doorway. Chad is on the bed in the center of the room. He seems so vulnerable in death; soft, human… even harmless. But she can never forget the evil he has inflicted. Her heart is hammering as she remembers her precious daughter, with her red curls and infectious laugh, and how she was lowered into that little grave…

It’s been five years since Detective Amanda Steele’s life was derailed in the path of an oncoming drunk driver. The small community of Dumfries, Virginia, may have moved on from the tragic deaths of her husband and daughter, but Amanda cannot. When the driver who killed her family is found murdered in a motel room, she can’t keep away from the case.

Fighting her sergeant to be allowed to work an investigation with such a personal connection to her, Amanda is in a race to prove that she can uncover the truth. But the more she digs into the past of the man who destroyed her future, the more shocking discoveries she makes. And when Amanda finds the link between a silver bracelet in his possession and the brutal unsolved murder of a young exotic dancer, she realizes that Chad was caught up in something darker than she had imagined. Amanda has stumbled upon another dangerous killer still at large, and she suspects that more girls are in danger.

But as Amanda edges toward the truth, she gets closer to a secret as personal as it is deadly. And in order to catch this killer – and save more girls as she couldn’t save her own daughter – she has to uncover terrible truths that have been buried for a very long time.

A gripping, page-turning thriller full of mystery and suspense. Perfect for fans of Rachel Caine, Lisa Regan and Robert Dugoni.