The book was one of those languishing on my backlist. I am glad I finally took the time out and read it. It is not a large volume and quite fast-paced at that. This essentially meant that I could read it in a sitting or two.
The plot starts off in a very cosy, mysterious feel, and the stakes are upped quite suddenly, and the danger is very real.
Verity is trying to be a good samaritan when she goes to the home of the man who dropped a notebook. She finds him bleeding out, and he tells her a couple of things before he passes on. This is information that could have been ignored by an almost recently widowed woman. Being the person she is, she starts to dig deeper and commits completely to solving the riddles. This is not something to be taken lightly since there is corruption at its core. The police and others might be complicit in the events, and Verity is unsure about who to trust.
The only reason I took away a star is that I thought the writer made the twist at the end quite obvious, given the way the lead protagonist thought. She should have suspected! The solution by itself seemed quite novel and made me root for a proper solution and a reasonable happily ever after.
There have been quite a few subsequent sequels written in this series. I haven't read any of them, but maybe I might pick up the next if I can, next year.
I received an ARC thanks to NetGalley and the publishers but the review is entirely based on my own reading experience.

Thank you Netgalley. I really enjoyed this book. The heroine is feisty and the action is non-stop. A simple incident sets of a complex chain of events. I hope I get to read more in this series soon.

No Deadly Medicine is a work of thriller and criminal mystery fiction penned by Trudey Martin, and it forms the first part of the Verity Spencer Thriller book series. The intrigue begins when central character Verity Spencer comes into possession of a notebook that other people would literally kill for, and is begged by its dying former owner not to take it to the police. Now it falls to her to become the notebook’s guardian and indeed the next target to be taken out in order for some very dangerous people to take it from her, so she must use all of her wits to survive and find a way to get out of the whole mess alive.

What a thrilling start to a series. I love the twists and turns in this one. The protagonist is an engaging character and will be fun to follow throughout this series as it develops.
Thank you for the early copy.
#NoDeadlyMedicine #Netgalley #BooksGoSocial

this was a really enjoyable mystery, the cover really drew me in and I really enjoyed reading this book. I look forward to more in the series.

Verity Spencer is on her way to an appointment when she spots an elderly gentleman accidentally drop his notebook. She was late, so she picked it up, saw an address, and decided she would run it by his house after her appointment.

Finding his house, she sees the door open. Against her better judgment, she enters calling out for the man. She finds him dying of a bullet wound. His house had been systematically trashed. With his dying breath he tells her not to give the notebook to the police ... trust no one.

BOOK BLURB: Verity is in above her head, engaged in a desperate race against time to uncover what the writing in the notebook means. Not knowing who to trust, and relying solely on her own resourcefulness, she gets dragged into a hazardous trail of discovery, endangering her life in the process.

Her house is broken into and everything is broken and trashed. She reasons out that someone wants the notebook ... but who? why? And someone will do anything at all to retrieve what she has.

The narrative was a bit slow in places. The story is told in Verity's voice and there is much description about people she sees, what they might be thinking, etc. I find it a little unbelievable as she is 40+ years old and winds up running and hiding for many hours at a time, hiding in various business places, and she's really good at fighting off the bad guys. . with no help. And while all this is happening, she discovers what the book means .. although she still doesn't have anyone she feels she can trust.

Many thanks to the author / BooksGoSocial / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

Our heroine, mature and recently widowed picks up a notebook to return to the old gentleman who dropped it. She keeps missing him and eventually gets to his home only to find his body. It's clear that someone nasty wants something he had, and that she now has. Far from leaving things for the police she keeps the notebook, tries to decipher the code in it, is chased by various bad guys, survives various attempts to kill her always outwitting them - just in time.. Too unbelievable for me and too much of 'look how clever I am working out these codes/clues whatever'. It might have been first person narrative presenting Verity's thought processes but it just felt contrived. Thanks to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

ou are tense from page 1. This book blows along like an action movie. I was instantly hooked, instantly impressed with the main character. There’s no fluff in this story. It moves you through the plot at break neck speed, building the ending subtly as you go along.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and the storyline was horribly believable in this day and age. I was close to giving it 4 stars, but something was holding me back. I think I found parts of the main character’s actions hard to believe. If she had been a detective or something similar it would have been more believable that she was able to think of how to react, what to do, crack codes, able to solve the mystery, etc. I’m not sure. It didn’t sit 100% with me. But really enjoyed the story!

Thank you so much to NetGalley for my Advance Reader Copy in exchange for my honest review.

No Deadly Medicine by Trudey Martin -- 4 Stars
Publisher: Books Go Social
ISBN: 9781702721646

I read a lot of mysteries and am always searching for something with an unusual plot. The description of the story of an elderly gentleman who drops his notebook and the woman who attempts to return it caught my attention. I was not disappointed.
Verity’s husband died recently. She is grieving and trying to decide what to do with her life when she finds herself in the center of more danger and action than she could ever have dreamed possible. She solves encrypted notes, fights bad guys, and saves the day. I enjoyed the adventure.

Reviewer: Nancy

Trudy Martin has created a new heroine in Verity, she would have been a wow at Bletchley Park the way she decoded things very Jeffery Deaverish in logical working then she turns into a Rambo style wonderwomen, no man is safe! Overall an interesting read which moves along at a very fast pace certainly no idle moment for this heroine. And another story to follow we are promised looking forward to that.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4 stars. Recently widowed Verity Spencer finds herself drawn into a deadly game of cat and mouse after picking up a notebook dropped by an elderly doctor.. When she goes to return the notebook, she finds the doctor dying of a gunshot wound in his house. With his dying breath, he begs her to hide the notebook and warns her to trust no one. Her decision to keep this promise places her life in jeopardy, and she quickly realizes that she must solve the mystery of the notebook if she is to have back her old life.. The notebook contains only a few numbers and some cryptic notes which she must decipher before those who want the notebook find her. So. begin this debut novel by Trudy Martin.

What I loved about this novel was the way in which the author walked the reader through Verity's approach to unraveling the code contained within the notebook.. By detailing her thought processes, it created a level of believability that is often absent in mystery series that feature everyday people turned detective. Similarly, the homemade weapons and tricks that our heroine devised to beat opponents who were larger and stronger than her rang true. My one criticism is that I wished that the author had trusted the intelligence of her reader more and not inserted a lecture on human trafficking (poorly disguised as Verity's research) in the middle of the novel. This lecture was unnecessary and interrupted the narrative flow. Still the series has potential. I would definitely try another book in this light-hearted, and often humorous, mystery series.

The story begins when an elderly doctor drops a notebook in the street.
Recently widowed, Verity finds the book and tries to do her civic duty by returning it, but on arrival at his home she discovers the man has been murdered. Deciding not to go to the police, she unwittingly gets involved in a trail of criminal activities. While searching for clues, she travels to London and spends many hours, ducking and diving from those who wish to harm her, hiding in various hotels, cafés and restaurants and even manages to beat off a very unsavoury character in her hotel room.
The story is told mainly through Verity’s thoughts and actions, which go into vivid descriptions of places and people and what they might or might not be thinking, which tended to be lengthy and slowed down the narrative.
This book failed to capture my imagination for a number of reasons. But mainly because I found it almost unbelievable that a middle-aged woman would, or could, take on such an extraordinary mission and tackle gangsters and thugs single-handedly and come out of it virtually unscathed.
Having said that, the book is well written and shows promise of things yet to come. 3 ½ stars.

Thank you Netgalley and BooksGoSocial for the eARC.
I liked the main character. She gets into a lot of trouble trying to do the right thing. Her home is ransacked, she has to go on the run, but somehow the bad guys still find her. She is quite a smart and tough cookie though, I really liked the way she fought back and came up with all sorts of ways of protecting herself, quite ingenious. I had a hard time with following the puzzles of the numbers and letters that she had to figure out and have to admit skipping over them. But all in all it was an enjoyable read and look forward to meeting her again.

Being a huge fan of thrillers and true crime, overall I really loved the premise of this book as the plot truly held a lot of promise. However, I found the narrative slacking in a fair few places, due to which I found myself struggling to stay engrossed in the book. A gripping thriller allows the reader to immerse themselves into the plot, and figure things out as they unfold in the plot, alternatively, refer back to previous parts to re-read and uncover the clues the author has left for them.

No Deadly Medicine is narrated as a first person account, and sometimes it seemed to me that the author was spending too much time spelling out every little bit for the reader, instead of letting them figure it out themselves, which personally I found anti-climatic, as it took away the thrill for me as a reader to join the dots and understand things which aren't explicitly stated.

I'd still be looking out for the next Verity Spencer novel, as I feel the central characters are very promising and could develop as the series progresses.