Synopsis
Buried in a woodland grave are a mother and her child.
One is alive. One is dead.
It is one of the most harrowing cases to hit D.C. Charlie Stafford’s department in years. Then more pairs of mothers and children go missing – and it’s Charlie’s job to find them.
Soon, Charlie is hunting down a brutal serial killer with a twisted mind. But as she closes in on the culprit, she realises she’s in more danger than she thought…
He’s watching. He’s waiting. Who’s next?
My Review
I have a huge confession to make- yes yet another one I hear you cry. Although I have a couple of Sarah’s book on my ever expanding ‘to be read’ mountain I haven’t actually read one yet…………..until now that is. I was invited to take part in the blog tour for the paperback release of ‘Mummy’s Favourite’ and I accepted because it was an ideal opportunity to get a taster of Sarah’s work and to read one of her books. Wowzers I was not to be disappointed. I absolutely LOVED reading ‘Mummy’s Favourite’ but more about that in a bit.
I couldn’t help but take to the character of Detective Constable Charlie Stafford from the first moment that I met her. She is a young woman, who is determined to make her mark in the police force and to impress her superiors. Charlie is good at what she does but she doesn’t like to boast about her talents or her skills. Charlie is feisty, determined and stubborn. When she gets a hunch, she follows her theory to the end until her own curiosity has been satisfied. I have to say that Charlie is like a dog with a bone in that respect. Charlie won’t stop investigating a case unless every piece of evidence has been examined, tested and either ruled out or ruled in as it were. It soon becomes clear that Charlie is a woman with a past, although the past isn’t explained during the first part of the book but clues are drip fed through the story and when the pieces are put together, the true picture emerges. It’s these events that help to explain why Charlie is the way she is. Charlie comes across as a tough nut with a rock hard exterior but in reality you don’t have to scratch the surface much until you realise that Charlie is just as vulnerable as the rest of us. I was keeping everything crossed that things would work out for Charlie in the end and that she would solve the case. Does she solve the case? Well for the answer to that question and more you are just going to have to read the book for yourselves to find out as I am not going to tell you.
Oh my word, Sarah Flint is one of those authors who starts the book in such a way that ensures that it will remain fresh in your mind for a long time to come. That’s what happened to me anyway. The story hits the ground running and maintains the pace throughout. I just had to carry on reading because I needed to know if Charlie managed to solve the case before too many more people became casualties. I soon became addicted to reading ‘Mummy’s Favourite’ and I found it near impossible to put the book down. The book wasn’t exactly glued to my hand but it might as well have been because it came everywhere with me. I thought that if I stopped reading I would miss something. I am a wee bit nosy (ok very nosy) and I love to eavesdrop. I seemed to race through the book but I didn’t realise just how quickly I had been reading until I checked on my progress and realised that I had read over 36%. I was so focused on the characters and on the storylines that I managed to shut out all other distractions.
For me ‘ Mummy’s Favourite’ is very well written. The writer has a writing style that is easy to get used to and easy to understand. Sarah uses such vivid and realistic descriptions that I found it easy to imagine that I was another (albeit invisible) member of the investigating team. I loved the way in which the author writes about her characters. The characters seemed to realistic that they almost seemed to jump off the page and come to life as it were. Certain characters were so realistic that they gave me the heebie jeebies and made my skin crawl.
Reading ‘Mummy’s Favourite’ was much like riding on a very scary and unpredictable rollercoaster ride with more twists and turns than you would know what to do with. A couple of times I smugly thought that I had fathomed out who was doing what and why only to realise that I had the wrong end of the stick completely and I was sent down another path. Sarah Flint certainly kept me guessing all the way through and she kept me on the edge of my seat.
For me, ‘Mummy’s Favourite’ is a fantastic start to a new series. I will certainly be catching up on the rest of the series just as soon as I can. I would definitely recommend this author and this series to other readers. I can’t wait to read what Sarah Flint comes up with next. The score on the Ginger Book Geek board is a very well deserved 5* out of 5*.
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