The Promise

First, the blurb I read on NetGalley is quite a bit different than the one on the retail sites, and while technically, both could describe this book, neither are exactly accurate. I also have to mention the cover. It's certainly eye-catching, but I can't for the life of me figure out what it has to do with this story. Our serial killer is strangling women, so I'm not sure where the blood comes in as I don't recall any in the book. As for the rest of it, I also don't recall any mention of a music box or a ballerina, so I used that handy little search feature on my Kindle and got nothing, not one mention of either of those in the book. Don't get me wrong, the cover is brilliant, but I don't see the correlation to the story. Speaking of which, I have to say that this one drove me a bit crazy. We have several characters throughout with rapid-fire jumps from one point of view to another. Off the top of my head, we have various victims of the serial killer, both detectives, a troubled and troublesome teenager, and what appears to be diary entries from an unknown woman. I would say that this is a police procedural, except they don't really do that much in the way of investigation. More time is spent on the fact that one is stressing over ending a relationship with a rather unsavory man that could cause problems in her job, and the other is grieving a girlfriend who was murdered while dealing with his ex and his son living under his roof because of some problem with the ex's current husband. I thought there may be some real investigation about to start when Imogen acts as bait, but even that was more about how Adrian felt about the whole thing. Then we have Connor and his father who have a rocky relationship that only gets rockier with each passing day while Connor apparently is completely irresistible to women of all ages. If it all sounds a bit convoluted, it is for much of the book. While I understand that the abrupt chapter endings are meant to build suspense and tension, the only thing that built in me was a growing aggravation over where it was all going. Things do eventually come together and the seemingly separate storylines converge, but not until quite late in the book. We do get enough breadcrumbs that I figured it out before the the big reveal, but that was little payoff for a story that took a somewhat circuitous route to get to a rushed and unsatisfactory ending. From glancing through the many high ratings on this one, I realize that I'm in the minority here, but it is what it is and my opinion is just that. The book did sound quite promising, but for me, it just didn't live up to its potential.

Absolutely 100% love this Author! Gripping drama throughout but with an excellent storyline to grip you from the first chapter. All 4 books are wonderful. I read them all in a week!

I have enjoyed all the books from Katerina Diamond but, this one bar far is my favorite one!! As always this book had me from the beginning and kept me guessing up until the end! I strongly recommend this book to everyone! Can't wait for the next one!