Book Review: Kill Me Again by Rachel Abbott

Kill Me Again by Rachel Abbott
Release Date: 17th February 2015
Publisher: Black Dot Publishing
Buy: Paperback | Kindle
Rating:

When your life is a lie, who can you trust?

When Maggie Taylor accepts a new job in Manchester, she is sure it is the right move for her family. The children have settled well although her husband, Duncan, doesn’t appear to be so convinced.

But nothing prepares her for the shock of coming home from work one night to find that Duncan has disappeared, leaving their young children alone. His phone is dead, and she has no idea where he has gone, or why. And then she discovers she’s not the only one looking for him.

When a woman who looks just like Maggie is brutally murdered and DCI Tom Douglas is brought in to investigate, Maggie realises how little she knows about Duncan’s past. Is he the man she loves? Who is he running from?

She doesn’t have long to decide whether to trust him or betray him. Because one thing has been made clear to Maggie – another woman will die soon, and it might be her.

Maggie Taylor is a happily married defence lawyer with two wonderful children. The family have recently moved to Manchester for Maggie’s job, and they seem to be settling in just fine. Or at least they were until Maggie returns home from work one night to discover that her husband, Duncan, has upped and left, leaving their two young children alone. With no explanation and no way of Maggie getting in touch with Duncan, she is even more alarmed when her son reveals he has seen a picture of a woman on his father’s phone. Perhaps innocent enough in itself, things take a more sinister turn when Maggie sees this woman on the news. Not only does she look exactly like Maggie but she has just been found murdered…

We join an old favourite of mine, DCI Tom Douglas, as he sets to work on the case. However, it’s not long before the murders are multiplying and they also seem to be mirroring murders from an unsolved case from 12 years ago. Then when a close friend and former girlfriend of Tom’s appears to go missing the pressure is really on to catch the culprit behind these murders before it’s too late.

Suddenly, Maggie isn’t the only one who is keen to track Duncan down…

After thoroughly enjoying two of Rachel’s previous novels, I was overjoyed and extremely excited about reading her latest offering, Kill Me Again, and in certainly didn’t disappoint.
I was captured right from the off and this story completely refused to let me go until I had discovered the truth for myself.
When we first meet Maggie and learn of Duncan’s vanishing act I was enthralled. I just HAD to know what was going on. Where had he gone? Why would a loving husband and father suddenly up sticks and leave his two young children at home on their own without leaving any explanation? This in itself was enough to hook me onto the story, but when his son Josh revealed what he had seen on his dad’s phone I was shocked, compelled and even more desperate to know what was going on.

I was chuffed when I learnt that DCI Tom Douglas was going to be investigating this case. He is gradually becoming a firm favourite of mine; he’s sensible, level-headed, smart and he also sounds rather handsome which always helps… I admire his commitment to the cases he works on and I love the interaction between him and his colleagues, particularly DI Becky Robinson. Becky is in a happy relationship, but I get the impression that she has a teeny bit of a crush on Tom, which makes their working relationship all the more fun to read about. It’s quite a light hearted take on things too because you know that nothing is going to happen between them; they are just really good friends and work really well together.

Maggie was also a brilliant central character. I really felt for the dilemma that she was in; particularly when she started to feel that she should speak to the police about Duncan’s disappearance, but at the same time she doesn’t want to cause him any trouble if he has been up to no good. It’s an awful decision to have to make – does she put the safety of herself and her children before her love and commitment to her husband? As a reader you can’t help but put yourself in Maggie’s shoes.

Rachel Abbott is such a talented writer; crafting an intriguing plot-line which will keep you reading into the late hours in a bid to discover what’s going to happen and creating fascinating characters who have so much depth to them.

Kill Me Again was fast, super-tense novel which kept me on the edge of my seat throughout…

This is now the third book of Rachel’s I have read and it certainly won’t be the last. I can’t wait to sample here earlier work and she has now secured a place on my list of favourite thriller writers.
A huge thank you to Katie Brown for the opportunity to review. ♥

Rachel Abbott was born and raised in Manchester. She trained as a systems analyst before launching her own interactive media company in the early 1980s. After selling her company in 2000, she moved to the Le Marche region of Italy. When six-foot snowdrifts prevented her from leaving the house for a couple of weeks, she started writing and found she couldn’t stop. Since then her debut thriller Only the Innocent has become an international bestseller, reaching the number one position in the Amazon charts both in the UK and US. This was followed by the number one bestselling novels The Back Road and Sleep Tight. Rachel Abbott now lives in Alderney and writes full-time. Stranger Child is her fourth novel.