Wrong Way Home by Isabelle Grey (D.I. Grace Fisher #4) @Hannah_Robbo @IsabelleGrey @Anne Cater @QuercusBooks

Source: Review copy
Publication: 17th May 2018 from Quercus
Pp 384

A cold case leads DI Grace Fisher on the hunt for the most dangerous killer of her career – but after twenty-five years, can she really be sure she will get to the truth?

The same night a local hero saved two people from the burning Marineland resort in Southend, a young woman was raped and murdered minutes from the scene of the fire, the culmination of a series of brutal rapes in the town. The killer was never found.

Twenty-five years on, new DNA techniques have blown the cold case open. DI Grace Fisher relishes the prospect of finally catching the culprit, but when the evidence doesn’t point to one clear suspect, she must reconstruct the original investigation. Any suggestion that the Essex force was less than thorough at the time could alienate her colleagues and destroy her chances of reaching the truth.

Grace finds her investigation shadowed by a young true-crime podcaster backed by veteran crime reporter Ivo Sweatman. As pressure mounts she cannot afford to be distracted. She knows that a cold-blooded killer is slowly being backed into a corner, and a cornered predator is often the most dangerous of all…

If you are a big fan of the Staunch Prize (the Staunch Book Prize will be awarded to the author of a novel in the thriller genre in which no woman is beaten, stalked, sexually exploited, raped or murdered), then this probably isn’t the book for you.

If, on the other hand, you are only too well aware of what can and does happen to women in real life, day in and day out, and you want to read a satisfying, well plotted and brilliantly written police procedural about how such cases are solved and the perpetrators brought to justice, then look no further.
Though this is the 4th book in the D.I. Fisher series, I have not sadly read the others, and that in no way hindered my enjoyment of this book. I will be remedying my reading gap soon, though, now that I have discovered this terrific series.

Grace Fisher inherited a set of Case Remains Open files when she came in to Southend as Senior Investigating Officer. The most serious of these cases was the rape and murder of 19 year old Heather Bowyer in 1992. Improvements in the technology around DNA analysis means that, after 25 years, the police have the first lead in the case. DNA analysis taken from a drunk driver after an accident, suggests that a close family member is a match to DNA found at the scene of Heather’s murder.

Freddie Craig is a young journalist. After a series of unpaid stints as an intern with newspapers, this poor lad is no closer than he was when he started, to getting a paid job in an industry where cheap and exploitative are by-words for what passes as local news journalism these days. He won’t give up though and has started a podcast looking into Heather’s death and also into the big Marineland Pier fire that started the same evening, for no other reason than the fact that he was also born on that memorable evening.

Ivo Sweatman is the Courier’s crime reporter. Now jaded from years of drinking and seeing corruption pervade throughout Southend, he takes a shine to Freddie, seeing in him the journalist that Ivo wanted to be all those years ago.

The narrative is told from the perspectives of Grace, Freddie and Ivo.
As Grace and her colleague DS Blake Langley begin to explore Deborah’s familial males looking for their match, they have no idea that they are walking into a pit of vipers and that before the case is concluded, the body count will have risen to terrible heights.

This is exceptional plotting, excellent writing and Grace Fisher is a tenacious character whose dogged courage and determination is slightly at odds with the more tentative personal side of her character. It is great to have a multi-dimensional protagonist who is both secure in leading her team at a professional level and can be emotional and compassionate.

Isabelle Grey has created a brilliantly suspenseful story in which the tension ramps high and the chilling nature of these crimes brings home the brutality of men who treat women as commodities.

Absolutely gripping, great storytelling and a tremendous read, Wrong Way Home is a sure-fire winner

Amazon Waterstones

About Isabelle Grey

Isabelle Grey is a television screenwriter whose credits include Jimmy McGovern’s BAFTA award-winning Accused: Tina’s Story as well as over thirty-five episodes of Midsomer Murders, Casualty, Rosemary and Thyme, The Bill and Wycliffe. She has also written non-fiction and been a magazine editor and freelance journalist. Isabelle’s previous novels include two psychological thrillers, The Bad Mother and Out Of Sight as well as the first two books in the DI Grace Fisher series, Good Girls Don’t Die, Shot Through the Heart and The Special Girls. Isabelle grew up in Manchester and now lives in north London.