Chris Patchell

With Deadly Lies, Chris Patchell manages to create a mostly unlikable main character that kept me interested and made me care what happened. Jill is outwardly nice to most people, but her internal dialogue and her private actions show an entirely different side of her personality. When she gets into trouble, it's difficult to feel empathy for her situation. Yet, learning about the childhood events that shaped her evokes unexpected sympathy. I found myself in this ongoing loop with her show more character, seeing aspects to like and even admire, and then cringing at some of her choices and actions.

The pace starts as a slow burn, gradually escalating until we get to an explosive ending. Some unexpected twists caught me totally off guard.

The content takes on secrets, lies, and deceit. Throughout this story are the underlying questions of how well we know the people we love, and how far we're willing to go to protect them and ourselves.

This is a provocative start to the series. I'm looking forward to finding out where Jill takes us next. show less

Note: Dark Harvest is Book 2 in the series and works best if read after Book 1 simply because you get so much character development that carries over from one book to the next.

I really liked that Brooke, who suffered a brutal kidnapping in Book 1, isn’t all sunshine and roses. She is still walking the hard, dark path to recovery. Marissa, her mom, struggles with how best to help her but she’s doing her best. Brooke’s younger sister, Kelley, puts in a few appearances but we see far less show more of her than in Book 1 and I missed her. Seth continues to be my favorite character. He’s doing his best to navigate these choppy waters with Marissa and her family, along with his work and memories of his dead wife.

Marissa was hard to root for in this book. She’s really self-centered and I think the author intended for us to see that. However, I don’t see Marissa becoming aware of her flaw and then taking action to better herself. She’s really wrapped up on Seth. He wants to give them all a bit of space to allow Brooke the time to heal and Marissa the time and energy to help Brooke. However, Marissa takes this as rejection. Ugh! Why, Marissa? Why? I wanted to give her a little reality check. I can see why she has a long history of failed relationships.

I also have to mention Marissa in one more thing. This is a MINOR SPOILER. Marissa has failed to take her birth control pill religiously and guess what happens? Yep. This really pissed me off about Marissa. She’s a career woman in her 30s who has basically raised her daughters on her own after becoming unexpectedly pregnant at 16. She’s been down this road before and apparently didn’t learn her lesson. The pill doesn’t work 100% of the time but when you negligently forget to take the pill daily, you’re borrowing trouble.

OK, so let’s talk about the mystery because that’s what really kept me in this book. Someone has been targeting pregnant women but no bodies have turned up. Pretty early on we get to know something about the kidnappers so the majority of the book is a cat and mouse game between the cops and the Holt Foundation and the bad guys. The motivations of the kidnappers were layered and deeper than I initially expected. I really liked that about this mystery. Tori, oh Tori! I wanted things to come out better for you even as I knew you had to pay for what you did. Xander Wilcox, I wonder if you were always so arrogant? Definitely interesting ‘bad guys’.

Seth struggles on several levels in this book. Henry, the computer genius at the Holt Foundation, doesn’t mind breaking laws to get data (phone records, arrest records, utility info, etc.). Seth has retained his cop sense of right and wrong and is mightily uncomfortable about Henry’s activities. However Nathan Holt isn’t interested in pushing Henry to follow the letter of the law. After all, the Holt Foundation is about finding victims before it’s too late. Seth is also struggling to both respect the needs of Marissa’s family as a whole and be supportive to Marissa as his girlfriend. Then he realizes that he hasn’t fully dealt with the death of his wife Holly. He’s a complicated guy and I really enjoyed watching him overcome one hurdle after another.

The ending had a few surprises. Henry! Oh, my! I also like that Seth has wrapped up some of the lose threads of his life. I would have liked further character growth for Marissa because she is a twit in this book. 4/5 stars.

The Narration: Lisa Stathoplos and Corey Gagne did a really good job with this book. I really like Gagne as Seth and Stathoplos has a perfect voice for Marissa. She also does a great job with the voices for Kelley and Brooke making all 3 ladies distinct but still sound related. I especially liked the aggravated, arrogant voice for Xander. 5/5 stars.

I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Chris Patchell. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it. show less

The Perfect Brother is the perfect choice it you're looking for a smart, thrilling, suspense-filled mystery!

The Perfect Brother is a page-turner extraordinaire! With a plot that has twists upon twists, I didn’t want to put this book down! The story is suspenseful from the beginning, starting with the disappearance of a young female student, and doesn’t let up until the final page.

The author has created an atmospheric setting for the story, with the chill and rain of Vancouver and much of show more the action occurring at night adding to the moodiness. When characters said they felt like someone was watching them, I felt it, too.

The main character, Indira Saraf, is a very strong female protagonist. She loves her family but doesn’t let her parents or her more compliant brother run her life. She refuses to go with the flow as her traditional Indian parents lean on her to marry or move home and chafes at being treated as second-rate because she’s female. I really enjoyed how she took matters into her own hands to help clear her brother’s name. And although I usually roll my eyes when amateur sleuths confront possibly dangerous suspects alone, with Indira, I almost felt like she could handle it. I liked both of the romantic interests in the story and approved of her final choice. Her bestie, Sabina, was a true ride-or-die friend.

As I mentioned, the plot had several twists and turns, most of which were shocking! There were also some good alternate suspects for Indira and her friends to weed through, making for some excellent red herrings. I didn’t guess the killer until the actual reveal. In addition, the moral and ethical dilemmas Indira faced regarding the software she was working on and then used in her investigation were thought-provoking.

With its clever plot and relatable main characters, I recommend THE PERFECT BROTHER to mystery and thriller readers, especially those who enjoy a touch of romance, fascinating and entertaining cultural aspects, or a setting in Vancouver.

I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving an Advanced Review Copy from the author through Partners in Crime Virtual Book Tours. show less

This was my first Chris Patchell novel but it won’t be my last. This story hooked me early and kept me captive the entire way through. Brooke Parker, the main victim, is more than just a prize to be won or lost. I felt I got to know her as a well-rounded character. She takes an active hand in her fate, even if it is just to keep herself alive one more day while being held captive. Brooke’s mom, Marissa, and her younger sister, Kelley, struggle to deal with her disappearance.

Those show more assisting the family to search for Brooke complete our list of potential heroes. There’s detective Seth Crawford whose got a haunted past of his own. Out of all the characters, he was my favorite. He’s got some big live choices in this novel all while under a ton of pressure to stop a serial killer. Then there’s also Evelyn Holt and her Holt Foundation. She sees the Foundation as a resource for people who have suffered from violent crime and she sees Marissa as a leader in that Foundation.

The one weakness to this novel is sometimes Marissa. I was OK with her being unsure of a lot of things in her life. She’s a 3X divorcee raising two kids on her own. Yet she knows for a certainty that Brooke would not take off without her travel insulin pack. She stands her ground, eventually convincing the police to open an investigation. However, later on in the story she gets a little sidelined with a romance. It felt a little forced and ill-timed. While I could see Marissa and this man getting together eventually, I felt that it was a bit too soon and the romance was forced to blossom too soon for drama’s sake.

There’s more than one bad guy in this novel so there’s a bit of clever misdirection as we and the good guys try to figure out who the serial killer is. The author had me guessing who was the greater culprit for the first third of the book. The wind up to discovering who was just as good as the chase towards the end of the novel. All told, I really enjoyed this murder mystery. 4.5/5 stars.

The Narration: Lisa Stathoplos and Corey Gagne both did a very good job narrating this book. The recording was excellent as the narrators sounded like they were in the same room. Stathoplos and Gagne both had distinct character voices and both had believable opposite sex character voices. The pacing was good as well. 5/5 stars.

I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Chris Patchell. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it. show less