I liked the story despite determining the killer early on. I didn’t know why. I enjoyed the continued character development.

Set in small town Western Pennsylvania, this excellent series shows a strong sense of place and characters. Zoe Chambers, originally a paramedic and now the County Coroner for Monongahela County was called to a particularly gruesome crime scene of a young girl raped and murdered. The crime seems reminiscent to a trio of grisly murders that occurred when Zoe was in high school. Coincidentally, or not, the 20th reunion is this very weekend. Well-written. Both the pacing and the characters keep the pages flying by. Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

“ The homicide appears to be a crime of passion until Pete’s relentless digging unearths a link between his prime suspect and Zoe’s serial killer. Suddenly, with the predator threatening to strike someone near and dear to both Zoe and Pete, they must race to uncover the truth and catch a madman before another innocent victim is brutally murdered.”
This was my first book by Annette Dashofy, but it won’t be my last. Coming into a series at book 11 meant that I didn’t have a good grasp of the key characters but I was easily able to jump into the action. This was a thrilling read and my initial guess at the baddie turned out to be accurate, however, I changed my mind 4 or 5 times. So the mystery definitely keeps the reader engaged. Surprisingly I liked the husband of the main character more than Zoe herself. Perhaps this wouldn’t be the case if I’d read the previous 10 books (which I know plan to do). I can highly recommend this book to fans of Kendra Elliot, Melinda Leigh and Karen Rose.
Can be read as a stand-alone book.
Thanks to Ms Dashofy, Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. 4.5/5 stars

Literally cried toward the end and I feel like if a book can make me sob, it deserves 5 stars

I received this book through Netgalley for review purposes.

When selecting this book I entirely missed the fact that it is the eleventh book in the series. Lucky for me, it read just fine as a standalone.

This book toes the line between cozy mystery and a typical police/coroner drama quite well. Zoe is a likeable protagonist and does her best to help her police chief husband solve a recent murder. There were a bunch of red herrings that made me question all assumptions I made about the murderer, and made me reevaluate potential suspects. I appreciate that this wasn't a predictable read.

I enjoyed this book enough that I will eventually go back and start the series at book one. I figure if you can write something interesting for the eleventh book in a series, there is a good chance the first ten are also worth reading.

Thank you Netgalley for providing this title for my honest review.

I loved this book. Taking my time to read this title instead of devouring it in one sitting I found myself thinking about it and problem solving the murders while I was doing to my day to day tasks. It was always on my mind. The twists and turns kept me on my toes. My only feedback, and I feel like this has been the case with a few thriller titles lately, the ending felt like it wrapped up very quickly.

On a side note. I didn't realize this was part of a series when I originally started reading it but I'll say that it works really well as a standalone title and as series. I did not feel like I was missing something once I realized that it was a series.