Murder in the Fens (Tara Thorpe Mysteries Book 4) by Clare Chase #Bookreview

When the body of twenty-year-old Julie Cooper is found – her pockets stuffed full of wilting flowers – in an iron-age hill fort on the edge of the fens, Detective Tara Thorpe and her team are called in to investigate. The evidence points to an illicit affair gone wrong… but is there more to the story?

As always at the Cambridge constabulary, the case turns personal. Detective Blake is exhausted after the arrival of a new baby with wayward wife Babette, and Tara is keen to put as much distance between herself and Blake as she can – both at the station and on the hunt for the killer. Charming rookie officer Jez is the perfect distraction… but is he a little too good to be true?

Then Tara makes a startling breakthrough when she finds an unsettling family heirloom hidden in the late victim’s bedroom – a golden statue of a sinister-looking cat with emerald eyes. As she traces its origins, Tara begins to realise that Julie’s murder is no one-off crime, but a sinister plot with its roots in a terrible secret that was covered up decades earlier.

My Review

It is good returning to another murder case for the Cambridge police detective team. A new young detective constable, Jez, has joined the team and Detective Inspector Blake organises the investigation into the murder of a campaigning female student, so that they each work alongside different colleagues at different times. The chemistry between the individual police officers and the progress made in solving the case make fascinating reading. On this occasion, Detective Tara Thorpe works with her team and does not intend to put herself in danger, but fate seems to be against her. Blake keeps his distance and she accepts there is no future for them now that he and his wife have a new baby. His personal life with a treacherous wife and two much loved children is highly stressful.

The friends and acquaintances of the victim, campaigning student, Julie Cooper, provide alibis yet have motives for desiring her death. A demanding friend, an ex-boyfriend and members of the college staff are all grilled and their actions investigated but it is almost too late when the murderer is identified.

Against all odds, many of the threads of the earlier books are brought to a conclusion but there are still unanswered questions which leave open the opportunity for a further volume in this very readable series.

My review of Death comes to Call (Book 3 of the Tara Thorpe Mysteries).