Lacey is back investigating crimes however this time it’s a group of men targeting women and babies - can she solve the case before someone gets seriously hurt?

I didn’t realise that this book was number 5 in the series however it’s going to give me a good opportunity to go back and read these books in the series. I did feel that it explained the parts of the series well though so I wasn’t too lost. I found the plot quite hard to deal with when babies were in danger but I thought the author had written it well. I liked the characters and the multi pov and really liked how the online crime was written about. This was my first by this author but I’m definitely going to read more!

loved loved loved loved loved. What else can you say about a Sharon Bolton book?

Reading The Dark I’m reminded once again why I LOVE her writing. Writing I can only aspire to.

Halfway through I came across this sentence and wow - “Women’s safety, even their freedom, depended entirely on the kindness of men.” it kind of punches you in the gut.

The Dark is terrifying in that slow creep of a way because in the back of your mind you fear the possibilities. Lacey Flint is a brilliantly complex character I love spending time with and I fancy Joesbury! Read it!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for approving me for this book.

I felt the writing was done well in this book but there was just something missing for me and I couldn't get into it and enjoy it as much as I hoped I would.

I tried my hardest to get into this, but I just couldn’t stick it out. I don’t think it is for me, this may be due to the nature of this book as it was very extreme

It is a joy to be back in the company of Lacey Flint and Mark Josebury and the dark world they inhabit. Sharon Bolton is the absolute queen of dark, tense, tightly-plotted books that keep you guessing all the way to the end, and make you worry constantly for characters you genuinely care about. I thought the exploration into the world of incels fascinating and terrifying, and the plot was genuinely frightening. And gah - it is so clever! I very much love Lacey Flint and Mark Josebury and the will-they-won’t-they thread, and thought the last chapter of this book was so beautifully written, it made me a bit teary. It’s a stunning book, super dark but also with shimmering rays of light and hope at its core.

I love this author and always find her books to be cleverly plotted and full of unexpected twists and this was no different. I really enjoyed this and found myself completely engaged from start to finish

Love this series and love Sharon Boston’s style of writing. Clever, scary but quite disturbing storyline and suspenseful throughout. Had me on the edge of my seat many times.
Lots of twists and turns as usual. Hope this series continues.

Classic Sharon Bolton. Grabs you by the scruff of the neck with tension in droves right from the opening chapters. Loved it!

This is the first Lacey Flint book I have read. I did enjoy it, easy characters to get to know and some twists and turns that I didn’t expect. With headlines about misogyny and violence against women frequenting our real life news feeds along with a realistic online ‘community’ operating through the dark web, this felt like it could almost be real.

Keen to read the other books in this series.

Thanks to #NetGalley ant the author and publisher for a preview copy of #TheDark

Everything a good thrilling page turner should be twists galore, a nerve tingling plot, fear and this book had them all. I could not out it down I was desperate to know what happened next. This is the first Sharon Bolton I have read but will be going back through them all now.
if you love a good thriller, I will highly recommend this book and author.
thank you to Net Galley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

#TheDark #NetGalley

A quick and interesting read and I didn't want to put it down! I had to find out what happened and finished it in 2 days. Looking forward to Sharon Bolton's next thriller!

Unfortunately this book was not for me, it was a bit slower than I would like and it just didn't hold my attention. I am sure other people will love it!

The Dark is absolutely the correct title for this book, it is indeed very dark and disturbing, not for the faint hearted. When I requested this book I did not realise it was part of a series, I have now purchased the rest of the series to read, based on this book.

Thank you to Netgalley, Orion publishers and Sharon Bolton for a copy in return for an honest review.

WOW!! This had me completely gripped within the first few pages.
I can't recommend it enough.

Lacy Flint a police woman with a dark past. Just when she believes that her future is taking a positive turn, a strange figure from her dark past re-enters her life driving a revolutionary anti-female movement. Lacy faces the prospect of having to destroy her own life to stop an adversary who is making it personal on every level.
That sounds like it should be on the book jacket. The Dark is in my view patchy. There are some scenes so well written and so frighteningly realistic that I can honestly say that my pulse raced and I could see and feel every detail as it unfolded. This was top class thriller writing at it's very best, and worth reading because of it.
Against that there were some corny moments, lazy plotting, and personally I believe that public reaction to the perceived revolution was unrealistic. This was 1980's behaviour in 2020.

Wow this book was truly fantastic! It kept me gripped right from the beginning and I could not put it down!
Thank you to Sharon Bolton, NetGalley and Orion Publishing Group for the opportunity to read and review this book.

*Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.*

I was pleasantly surprised by what I thought was just another run of the mill police procedural. It had some very tense moments, and Lacey Flint was a character with some real depth to her. The crane scene freaked me out (in a good way!) and I'm very interested in reading the rest of the Lacey Flint series, as this is book five.

When a baby is snatched from its mother and thrown into the Thames aboard an inflatable unicorn, off-duty police officer Lacey Flint gives chase in her kayak. It soon becomes clear this terrifying incident is to be the first of many. DCI Mark Joesbury has been following the trail of a group of women-haters who have been communicating through the dark web, and had known that something was about to happen. Now he and his team know that the men involved are planning a campaign of terror, directed at women. And by getting involved in this first incident, Lacey has made herself a target…

Wow! When Sharon Bolton is on top form, there is no one to beat her. And she is most certainly on her top form in this one! Of course it’s a pleasure to meet up with Lacey and Mark and the rest of the regulars again, and to see how their lives have developed since we last saw them, which seems like a very long time ago. Dana and Helen are now the proud parents of a son, and this makes the whole terror campaign even more frightening for Dana since these men realise that one of the best ways to frighten women is to go after their children. I don’t want to reveal much about Lacey and Mark, since there may be people reading this who haven’t read the rest of the series, so I’ll just say that their running on/off relationship continues to move forward in this instalment. And Bolton continues to use her chosen setting of the Thames to brilliant effect, with Lacey still working in the Metropolitan Police’s marine unit.

The storyline is both fantastic and terrifyingly possible. It’s based on the idea of incels, which has become one of those words that gets bandied around these days, usually as an insult. However Bolton shows them not as a trivial group of disgruntled men who can’t get girlfriends, but as the basis of a seriously misogynistic movement with the aim of removing the hard won rights of women and returning them to a position of subservience within a new patriarchy. She does an amazing job of showing how feasible such an organisation would be, and compares their aims to the kinds of strict patriarchal regimes that already exist in other parts of the world, which makes the whole idea seem considerably less unlikely than it might do on face value in our (supposedly) liberal world. (As I was reading it, The US Supreme Court was in the process of removing the right to abortion, while in most of the West a heated debate is underway on all aspects of women’s rights, with many things that we have fought long and hard for suddenly seeming to be under threat amid attempts by extremist activists to silence women’s voices. Johnny Depp was suing Amber Heard, and whichever side you’re on in that one I suspect we would all agree that the sexualised abuse and death threats directed at Heard daily on social media have been a real sign that misogyny is alive and well, and very often propped up by women.)

Bolton also uses the idea of the dark web to great effect, showing it as a place where all kinds of organisations can group and recruit members, spread information and disinformation, and conspire to commit all kinds of criminal acts under the noses of the authorities but with them unable to identify the names or locations of the people involved. I don’t know whether this is true or not, having no experience whatsoever of the dark web, but I found it scarily believable.

However, Bolton knows how to get the balance right between this all too believable background and the main thriller elements that keep the pace hurtling along. There are aspects that aren’t wholly credible, but I didn’t have time to stop and think about them as my need to keep turning those pages was too strong. I did guess who the baddie was quite early on, but because this is more of a thriller than a straight mystery that didn’t matter – the tension comes from fear of what will happen in the future rather than from discovering the culprit.


Sharon Bolton
I do like the way Lacey has evolved over the series. Bolton has done it slowly and naturally, so that it feels realistic. She’s now less of a loner, beginning to let her guard down a bit with the people she has come to think of as friends. This makes her more likeable than she was in the beginning, and from my perspective that’s a good thing – I always prefer a likeable central character. And no spoilers, but the very last line left me gobsmacked – I did not see that coming! Unfortunately, or that should really be fortunately, you’ll have to read the entire series in order to find out what I’m talking about – my advice would be to start now… 😉 Great book, great series! Keep ‘em coming, Ms Bolton!

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Orion via NetGalley.

Fantastic and one of my favourite adventures featuring Lacey Flint. The novel brings to life the worrying power that incels and the dark web have on society today. The opening scene of a baby being kidnapped and the attempted escape was an incredible introduction to the book.

Firstly, why did I leave this on my netgalley shelf for so long and how have I not heard of Lacey Flint before?

Whilst I was reading this, I immediately wanted it to be the start of a series, so was delighted to realise that I was late to the game and it’s already a series! 🤦🏼‍♀️

I loved everything about this book, the characters, the plot, the settings and the oddities which are incels.

In my library I will be having individual shelves for favourite authors/book series, I will now be getting the back catalogue of the authors work so she can have her own.

I couldn’t recommend this book more, easily one of my favourites of the year!