The Drowned Woman (Jericho and Wright #2) by C.J. Lyons

EXCERPT: Flying. She was flying.

Wind sliced against her face. Time was fluid, slippery. Was it centuries, or seconds? She knew she was falling from the lurch in her stomach. She took a ragged breath, in and out, then a slam jolted through her, and her entire body propelled forward until the airbag blew and the seatbelt grabbed her, holding her in place with a bruising grasp.

Her eyes fluttered open as the first splash of frigid water crashed through the open window beside her. She shook her head, startled to be awake – to be alive. Her throat was raw, every breath an effort. Her head throbbed, ears shrieked, body bruised. Hands flailing, fighting…

More water, seeping up from below, streaming through the windows – the car, she was in her car. In the river – how? She blinked, tried to focus past the pain and the rushing noise that consumed her mind. Why?

He’d tried to kill her…Why?

ABOUT ‘THE DROWNED WOMAN’: One month since she lost her husband, Dr Leah Wright knows it’s time to return to her family home. Though the crime scene tape and blood stains are gone, she will never feel safe with her daughter there again. Receiving a call from Detective Luka Jericho to assist with a police investigation is a welcome distraction, until she sees the scene: a wife dead, another family ripped apart.

As Leah is the new head of the Crisis Intervention Center, Luka knows she can help him speak to the victim’s traumatized husband, who he suspects might have had something to do with his wife’s death. But when Leah interviews the woman who lives across the hall, they uncover evidence of a serial killer in their rural Pennsylvania town. The same person who claims responsibility for drowning Luka’s fiancée seventeen years ago…

With danger closer to home than ever before, Leah realises that to find the killer they may need to dig into Luka’s past. But the killer is already taunting Luka, promising to kill again. Is it already too late to save another innocent life?

MY THOUGHTS: Fast paced. Full of action and angst. There’s a lot going on and you need to keep your wits about you. You will also need to suspend a little belief in places.

The characters are all dynamic and damaged. My favourites are Walt, who has Huntington’s, and the two children, Nate and Emily. Nate is scared to love anything, anyone, believing that that if you love something, someone just comes along and steals it from you, and swears that he is never, ever going to love anyone. My heart literally broke for this child. Emily is more resilient, but then up until recently she has had a far more stable life. She shows wisdom beyond her years in her support of Nate and her approach to problem solving.

Leah and Luca and their associates are caught up in an intense and fraught situation which is certainly riveting and a definite page turner. But as I was reading there was this little voice whispering, ‘Isn’t there just too many too badly damaged characters?’ I guess that the answer for me was ‘yes.’ The same little voice also whispered the name of the killer quite early on in the book, and was right. After a split second of jubilation that I had actually detected correctly, I realized that I hate it when that happens.

This is the second book in the Jericho and Wright Thriller series. I recommend that you read the first book in the series, The Next Widow, prior to reading The Drowned Woman, as the backstory is frequently referred to.

If you love a lot of action then you will love The Drowned Woman. For me, Nate and Emily were the highlight.

⭐⭐⭐.7

#TheDrownedWoman #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over forty novels, former pediatric ER doctor CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about in her cutting edge Thrillers with Heart. She also writes YA SF and thrillers under the pen name Cat Lyons.

Two time winner of International Thriller Writers’ prestigious Thriller Award, CJ has been called a “master within the genre” (Pittsburgh Magazine) and her work has been praised as “breathtakingly fast-paced” and “riveting” (Publishers Weekly) with “characters with beating hearts and three dimensions” (Newsday). (Amazon)

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Bookouture via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of The Drowned Woman by C.J. Lyons for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

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