Book Reviews and More: Here Lie the Dead - J.D. Kirk

Monday 14 November 2022

Here Lie the Dead - J.D. Kirk - DCI Logan Book 15

Here Lie the Dead

DCI Logan Book 15

J.D. Kirk

Zertex Crime

ISBN 9781912767649

ASIN B09ZF94Q1D

It was with a some sadness that I finished this novel. I have been reading a book by J.D. Kirk a week for a few months now, and after this I am all caught up. I believe the wait will be several months for the next volume. This is another great read in an excellent series! This is the nineteenth volume from J.D. Kirk that I have read in the last few months. I have enjoyed all that I have now read to date, a few were pretty gruesome, but watching Logan and the team, and even Hoon makes for some very entertaining reading. I have read the first 15 in the DCI Logan series and also the first 3 in the Robert Hoon series, as well as stand alone VIP exclusive short story. I picked the first for a few reasons, but mainly because authors Alex Smith and JE Mayhew have both recommended the author and series. I am a big fan of Smith’s DCI Kett novels and Mayhew’s DCI Will Blake Series. I was hooked from that first read. I had no idea how addictive Kirk’s books would be or that like Mayhew and Smith, Kirk publishes under three different names. Kirk publishes children books as Barry Hutchison, and other adult fiction as Barry J. Hutchison. He is coming up on 175 books across the three pen names. If I had known that or I might not have picked up this first one. Friends call me a ‘completionist’ in that when I find an author I like, I try to read everything they have published. Being caught up now on his works as J.D. Kirk I will now branch out to the others. But back to this volume.

The description of this novel is:

“Six months ago, a girl vanished. Now, it’s happening again.

When the body of a teenager is discovered near Eilean Donan Castle several months after she disappeared, DCI Jack Logan and his team journey across the Highlands to investigate.

As they start to unpick the young woman’s life, the secrets and lies they expose soon threaten to tear the small, rural community apart.

But, when a second girl goes missing in similar circumstances, it isn’t just a murder investigation that Jack finds himself running.

It’s a race against time.”

Like many of the other stories in this series the murder is gruesome, and as a father of daughters this time particularly so. This story starts with a wedding, and a particularly nasty Bridezilla! And that was even before a body was found during her photo shoot. Soon Logan and the team are working out of a very small detachment. The Town is in an uproar. And Another girl has gone missing. The layers and layers of secrets in both girls’ lives, and in the town is staggering. It is up to Logan and the team, and they are racing against the clock.

It is another great read in an excellent series. I love the two series written under the pen name J.D. Kirk are definitely Scottish Mysteries, and I can see the comparisons with Smith’s and Mayhew’s works, as well as several other more mainstream names. Each time I finish a book by Kirk it takes willpower not to just pick up the next one and keep going. I have now read all the books published buy this author under this name, and I am looking forward to that new series that has been teased, and the forthcoming Hood and Logan novels. As mentioned it is now time to branch out into his other works. I love that the stories are set in Scotland! This book and series would be great reads for fans of Jack Reacher, Jack Ryan, or Temperance Brennan. I state it again it is a great read in an excellent series!

Books by J.D. Kirk:

The Bone House

…

DCI Logan Series:

The Last Bloody Straw

A Whisper of Sorrows

The Big Man Upstairs

A Death Most Monumental