Book review: Evil Games by Angela Marsons

"When a rapist is found mutilated in a brutal attack, Detective Kim Stone and her team are called in to bring a swift resolution. But, as more vengeful killings come to light, it soon becomes clear that there is someone far more sinister at work. 

With the investigation quickly gathering momentum, Kim finds herself exposed to great danger and in the sights of a lethal individual undertaking their own twisted experiment. 

Up against a sociopath who seems to know her every weakness, for Detective Stone, each move she makes could be deadly. As the body count starts to mount, Kim will have to dig deeper than ever before to stop the killing.

 And this time - it’s personal."

Well, she's done it again. Angela Marsons has created yet another brilliantly written, gripping story that had me hooked from beginning to end. After the HUGE success of Silent Scream (the first novel in the DCI Kim Stone Series) Evil Games had a lot to live up to. But boy did it.

Like Silent Scream, the story flits between the narrative of the two main characters: DCI Kim Stone and Alex - the 'bad guy' for this story. Both these characters are absolutely remarkable and I loved reading about them, for very different reasons.

As an audience we already became acquainted with DCI Kim Stone in Silent Scream, and I loved her character as much in Evil Games as I did in the debut. She remains a gritty, hard-faced and, at times, difficult woman that is not to be messed with. I loved seeing her friendship with her colleague Byrant further develop- he is one of the few people she slightly opens up to and I enjoyed seeing a lighter side to Kim. She is still a work-a-holic, living and breathing the investigation at hand until it is resolved. Her strong work ethic warmed me to her as despite her abrupt nature you know she's doing things for the right reasons and I was rooting for her from the very start, willing her to solve the crime and cotton on that Alex isn't quite as picture-prefect as she appears.

That's brought me nicely on to Alex. What a unique, unusual antagonist to have in a story. Portrayed as a picture-prefect psychiatrist, Alex appears to be a completely normal, albeit glamorous, woman. What people don't realise is she is a twisted person with an interesting motive behind her selection of patients, choosing them specifically to work into her rather evil plan. I don't want to say too much else as it'll ruin it, but I thought Alex was a refreshing character that, although clearly the 'bad guy', isn't the usual, obvious murderer you'd expect in this kind of story. (Hopefully that should make more sense once you've read the book!)

The story develops at a fast pace and is gripping throughout, leading up to a huge conclusion that had me reeling for a few days. As with most stories, there is a big build up towards a final explosive conflict between the main characters and my, oh my, is that what happens. I won't say much more but the final few pages had me reading as fast as I could to find out what happens and it is so worth it. A satisfying ending with the only disappointment being that I'd finished! (boo).

I find it remarkable that an author can jump onto the crime-writing scene and provide an outstanding debut as well as an equally as brilliant sequel in the same year (well - half a year to be exact!). Angela is truly fantastic and I am so, so pleased she is firmly on the crime (writing) scene. She is a true expert at creating tension, providing just the right level of detail and creating characters that jump off a page. Angela firmly deserves all the success she has achieved with Silent Scream so far, and I'm sure that Evil Games will follow on and be a big success.  

If you haven't already gathered from this gushing review, I'd highly HIGHLY recommend this book. Just free up some time to read it as once you begin, you won't want to stop until you've read the very last word.

Now to start the wait for the third book in the series.....

Links:
Buy Evil Games 
Buy Silent Scream
My review of Silent Scream 
Author website 
Angela Marsons twitter