A killer uses death metal band Wishbone’s lyrics to kill his victims in a horrific way. DS Jason Smith is back from a traumatic vacation so can he stay focussed and find the murderer before the next lyric is brought to life (death)…?
Wishbone is the fifteenth novel to feature DS Jason Smith, his wife DC Whitton and the rest of their team. Smith and Whitton’s personal life is in turmoil following events in the previous book (which I have somehow missed 🙁 ) and there are major spoilers so I would advise reading the series in order.
I literally devoured this book. It is gory, gruesome, grisly and VERY graphic but I just couldn’t put it down. The murder methods and forensic details are described in detail and they are horrific.
Smith and Whitton begin the book on leave, recovering from events in Australia. But Smith is champing at the bit to get back to work and this case needs his expertise. Women are being killed in a way linked to song lyrics from a death metal band (not a genre of music that I was really aware of, and not one I’ll be following now!)
The pace of the plot is completely relentless and this is a real page turner of a book. There are not many suspects to choose from, unless it is a deranged fan, and the police are anxious to get ahead of the killer to prevent any more sickening murders. Our witnessing of the lyrics ramps up the anticipation of the murders which we then experience too, dreading what we know will happen but unable to tear our eyes away from the page!
Despite the grisly crimes and the worry over Smith’s daughter’s mental health, there are touches of humour such as when Smith and Whitton attend a death metal gig and wry comments about their superior officers.
Wishbone is a brilliantly gruesome police thriller and I absolutely loved it!
Book blurb
WISHBONE
‘BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR.’
These seemingly innocent song lyrics are about to send Detective Jason Smith over the edge.
Still traumatised after a harrowing trip back home, Smith is sent headlong into the stuff of nightmares when he returns to work. When a woman is found dead with her spinal cord severed Smith and his team are thrown into the most disturbing investigation ever.
Then another body is found and when Smith realises what this woman was subjected to he knows he’s on the trail of the most sadistic killer he’s ever come across.
All clues point to a death metal band.
Wishbone are in town for a few shows and when Smith realises all the murders bear striking similarities to their song lyrics he starts to wonder if there is something more to this band than meets the eye.
This is the most horrifying case of Smith’s career and one the people of York will never forget.
Author bio
After reading English at 3 Universities and graduating from none of them, I set off travelling around the world with my wife, Ann, finally settling in South Africa, where we still live.
In 2014 Ann dropped a rather large speaker on my head and I came up with the idea for a detective series. DS Jason Smith was born. Smith, the first in the series was finished a few months later.
3 years and 8 DS Smith books later, Joffe Books wondered if I would be interested in working with them. As a self-published author, I agreed. However, we decided on a new series – the DC Harriet Taylor: Cornwall series.
The Beekeeper was published and soon hit the number one spot in Australia. The second in the series, The Perfect Murder did just as well.
I continued to self-publish the Smith series and Unworthy hit the shelves in 2018 with amazing results. I therefore made the decision to self-publish The Backpacker which is book 3 in the Detective Harriet Taylor series which was published in July 2018.
After The Backpacker I had an idea for a totally new start to a series – a collaboration between the Smith and Harriet thrillers and The Enigma was born. It brought together the broody, enigmatic Jason Smith and the more level-headed Harriet Taylor.
The Miranda trilogy is something totally different. A psychological thriller trilogy. It is a real departure from anything else I’ve written before.
The Detective Jason Smith series continues to grow with book 16 coming soon. In addition I have an new series featuring an Irish detective who relocated to Guernsey. The first 4 books in the Detective Liam O’Reilly series are now available.
Pingback: Blog Tour Wrap Up – WISHBONE (Detective Jason Smith #16) by Stewart Giles #bookreview #detective #crimefiction #bookshelf #bookstagram @stewartgiles @booksnall2020 – Books n All Promotions