#BookReview It All Falls Down by Sheena Kamal @WmMorrowBooks

It All Falls Down by Sheena Kamal
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The brilliant, fearless, deeply flawed Nora Watts—introduced in the "utterly compelling" (Jeffery Deaver) atmospheric thriller The Lost Ones—finds deadly trouble as she searches for the truth about her late father in this immersive thriller that moves from the hazy Canadian Pacific Northwest to the gritty, hollowed streets of Detroit.

Growing up, Nora Watts only knew one parent—her father. When he killed himself, she denied her grief and carried on with her life. Then a chance encounter with a veteran who knew him raises disturbing questions Nora can’t ignore—and dark emotions she can’t control. To make her peace with the past, she has to confront it.

Finding the truth about her father’s life and his violent death takes her from Vancouver to Detroit where Sam Watts grew up, far away from his people and the place of his birth. Thanks to a disastrous government policy starting in the 1950s, thousands of Canadian native children like Sam were adopted by American families. In the Motor City, Nora discovers that the circumstances surrounding Sam’s suicide are more unsettling than she’d imagined.

Yet no matter how far away Nora gets from Vancouver, she can’t shake trouble. Back in the Pacific Northwest, former police detective turned private investigator Jon Brazuca is looking into the overdose death of a billionaire’s mistress. His search uncovers a ruthless opiate ring and a startling connection to Nora, the infuriatingly distant woman he’d once tried to befriend. He has no way to warn or protect her, because she’s become a ghost, vanishing completely off the grid.

Focused on the mysterious events of her father’s past and the clues they provide to her own fractured identity and that of her estranged daughter, Nora may not be able to see the danger heading her way until it’s too late. But it’s not her father’s old ties that could get her killed—it’s her own.

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It All Falls down is the sequel to the fabulous The Lost Ones. In this book is Nora Watts approached by a man that claims to have known her late father. Nora doesn't know much about her father, and the man's inquest about her and her sister makes her search for facts about her father. This eventually takes her from Vancouver to Detroit where Sam Watts grew up. The more she learns about her father and ultimately her mother makes her realize that the circumstances around her father suicide are more complicated than she thought.

At first, the story in this book seems to be just about Nora's father. Then, Nora starts to discover more about the mother she hardly remembers. And, ultimately Nora will realize that her own ghosts are still out to get her. If you have read the first book do you know about Nora's hunt to find her daughter Bonnie (that she gave up for adoption) that disappeared. She may have brought Bonnie home, but there are still people out there that will Nora ill.

I love how this book gave Nora and the reader more knowledge about Nora's parents. As the first book was about Nora and Bonnie does this feel great to get to know more about Nora and her family. Of course, Bonnie is still there in the story. Love the pics they send to each other, in a way to tentatively have a contact. Then, there is Jon Brazuca doing his own research into the death of a friend's mistress. That part was OK even though I much preferred when he decided to help Nora instead. The ending of the book makes me long for the next book in the series!

I want to thank William Morrow for providing me with a free copy through Edelweiss for an honest review!

#BookReview In the Grip of It by Sheena Kamal @HarperCollins

In the Grip of It by Sheena Kamal
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

On a surveillance assignment for a child custody case, PI-in-training Nora Watts finds herself ensconced in a small farming community on a beautiful hippie island in the Pacific Northwest, a place with a reputation for being welcoming to outsiders. But when she arrives there, she discovers her welcome quickly wears thin. Perhaps too quickly.

Salt Spring Island, with a history as a refuge for African Americans fleeing the bonds of slavery, is not a place of refuge for her—and, she suspects, may not be for the people who live there, either.

As she investigates, nothing about this remote community seems to add up. It gets personal as Nora confronts her own complicated feelings toward her estranged daughter and becomes increasingly concerned about the child she’s been tasked to surveil. She discovers that small, idyllic communities can hide very big secrets.

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Last year I read the marvelous thriller The Lost Ones by Sheena Kamal. And, now I'm waiting to read In the Grip of It that I have waiting for me. But, a while did I read In the Grip of it, a novella that takes place between the books. And, what a great story it was. 

Nora Watts is hired to find a woman and her son that have joined a community. At first, does the place seem quite alright, but after digging around does she get the feeling that something is wrong, dangerously so...

In the Grip of It can easily be read as a stand-alone novella. You get some tidbits about Nora so you know the gist about her so having not read the first book wouldn't be a problem. I personally liked this story so much that I'm now dying to read the sequel novel!

I want to thank Witness Impulse for providing me with a free copy through Edelweiss for an honest review!

#BookReview Eyes Like Mine by Sheena Kamal

Eyes Like Mine by Sheena Kamal
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It's late. The phone rings.

The man on the other end says his daughter is missing.

Your daughter.

The baby you gave away over fifteen years ago.

What do you do?

Nora Watts isn't sure that she wants to get involved. Troubled, messed up, and with more than enough problems of her own, Nora doesn't want to revisit the past. But then she sees the photograph. A girl, a teenager, with her eyes. How can she turn her back on her?

But going in search of her daughter brings Nora into contact with a past that she would rather forget, a past that she has worked hard to put behind her, but which is always there, waiting for her...

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Eyes Like Mine starts off with Nora Watts learning that her daughter Bonnie that she gave birth to 15 years ago, but didn't keep has gone missing. Has Bonnie run away, or have she been kidnapped? For Nora is Bonnie just an awful reminder of something traumatic that happened to her years ago, but still, she can't help, but try to find out the truth about what happened to Bonnie.

Eyes Like Mine is a bleak thriller about a woman that has been through so much since she was a child that it's amazing that she has the strength to keep going. Her mother left her and her younger sister and her father killed himself when they were very young and they ended up in foster care. Then, years later she ends up pregnant with a child she doesn't want. And, now she has to face the past and through the book, we learn the truth about what happened to her that made her give up her daughter.

It's not hard to feel sorry for Nora Watts, she has been through so much and not with not much support through her life. Her sister is a real bitch. She does, however, have the greatest bosses, a gay couple and she also has a dog that, despite Nora's pessimistic nature seems to like her more than Nora thinks. She also has a strained relationship with her ex-sponsor.

The book is engaging to read, you get pulled into the story and it doesn't let you go. I did, however, feel that I wanted to know more when the story ended, not that the ending was bad, just that I wanted to know what would happen next.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!