I’m pleased to welcome you today to my stop on the blog tour for the fantastic Cover Your Tracks by Claire Askew. Thank you to Jenny Platt and Hodder & Stoughton for giving me the opportunity to read and review this riveting police procedural thriller.
About the book:
‘What if I told you,’ he said, ‘that I believe my mother’s life to be in danger?’
Robertson Bennet returns to Edinburgh after a 25-year absence in search of his parents and his inheritance. But both have disappeared. A quick, routine police check should be enough – and Detective Inspector Helen Birch has enough on her plate trying to help her brother, Charlie, after an assault in prison. But all her instincts tell her not to let this case go. And so she digs.
George and Phamie Bennet were together for a long time. No one can ever really know the secrets kept between husband and wife. But as Birch slowly begins to unravel the truth, terrible crimes start to rise to the surface.
Beautifully written and ingeniously plotted, Cover Your Tracks confirms Claire Askew as a major new talent in crime fiction.
About the author:
Claire Askew is a poet, novelist and the current Writer in Residence at the University of Edinburgh. Her debut novel in progress was the winner of the 2016 Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, and longlisted for the 2014 Peggy Chapman-Andrews (Bridport) Novel Award. Claire holds a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Edinburgh and has won a variety of accolades for her work, including the Jessie Kesson Fellowship and a Scottish Book Trust New Writers Award.
Her debut poetry collection, This changes things, was published by Bloodaxe in 2016 and shortlisted for the Edwin Morgan Poetry Award and a Saltire First Book Award. In 2016 Claire was selected as a Scottish Book Trust Reading Champion, and she works as the Scotland tutor for women’s writing initiatives Write Like A Grrrl! and #GrrrlCon.
Her first novel, All the Hidden Truths, was published in 2018.
My Review:
Oh wow, what a brilliant read this is! Cover Your Tracks by Claire Askew may very well be the third in the DI Birch series, but it reads incredibly well as a standalone. Having said that, though, I enjoyed it so much I will definitely go back and read the first two in the series as soon as time allows!
Not only does the story move along at a cracking pace, keeping you turning the pages long into the night, but it’s also a very character driven tale, with two strong female leads who you can’t help but warm to from the outset. DI Helen Birch is an intriguing character who I look forward to learning even more about, both in the previous two books and as the series continues. But as capable and headstrong as Birch is, there’s also a vulnerability to her character that drew me to her like a moth to a flame.
I love a book with a strong female character at its heart and this one has two! Birch’s partner, DC Amy Kato, is every bit as intriguing as her boss, with the camaraderie between the two women being one of the highlights of the book for me.
Cover Your Tracks is a cleverly plotted crime thriller that kept me guessing throughout. The central storyline of a man searching for his missing parents after a twenty five year absence is a meaty one, full of the twists, turns, intrigue and suspense that make this sort of read so interesting! Claire Askew’s writing is superb as the intricate details of the plot slowly begin to come together, leading to a denouement that is as satisfying as it is thrilling.
I loved this page turning joy of a read and can’t wait to see where the author is going to take these memorable characters next! Cover Your Tracks is an excellent crime thriller that I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend.
Cover Your Tracks by Claire Askew is available to purchase now: Amazon UK
Check out what these other lovely bloggers have to say about this book:
Cal Turner Reviews 