Like This, For Ever by S.J. Bolton

Like This, For Ever by S.J. Bolton
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Young boys are kidnapped and then found drained of blood. There are no clues nor witnesses  to be found. And, at any time could a boy be taken and killed. For Detectives Dana Tulloch and Mark Joesbury is this a frustrating case and for Dana is it hard to see the bodies of the little boys left on a Thames beach. She has never thought about being a mother, but this case stirred emotions in her she never thought she would have. For Lacey Flint is the case nothing she wants to get involved in, she hasn't recuperated from her ordeal in Oxford and getting involved in a new case is the last thing she wants unless she involuntary gets dragged into it...

Like This, For Ever is the third book in the Lacey Flint series and it's a dark story, just like the other books. The killing of children is, in my opinion, the hardest kind of crime books to read. That and killing of animals. There is just something unthinkable about hurting the innocent that reading books about it is really hard. 

The interesting thing about this book is that we beside Mark, Dana, Lacey, the usual characters involved in the book's narrations we also get the narrative of a young boy Barney through the book. He is a neighbor to Lacey, and she is worried when he is out late. He meanwhile is also studying the case of the missing boys and he discovers there are patterns to the murders...

There are a lot of potential suspects in this book, but the story took a different turn than I had expected. I always love the part of the book when everything starts to come together and make sense and in this book. In this book, it's like getting a bucket of ice cold water emptied over your head. The kind of conclusion when you're are taken with the story, but there is also a dread in reading it because you are figuring it out...

Beside the case we Mark trying to get through to Lacey, one would think that the ending of the second book would have solved some things in their relationship, but Lacey seems to be hell-bent on pushing Mark out of her life, despite her feelings for him. I'm however glad that the case from the last book seems to have been closed, I did feel that the previous book ended with some questions never answered when it came to the case in Oxford. I'm pleased that's over. It was also great to have Dana back since she was absent in the previous book and also it was really great to finally meet Huck, Mark's son. Love that name. Huckleberry Joesbury. I think it's probably good that I don't have children...;)

You can read the books as stand-alone, but personally, I feel that you will understand the story and especially understand Lacey Flint better if you read the series from the beginning.