Another cracking addition to the Hillary Greene series. I like how she develops as a character over the series as we get to know her and her team better. Looking forward to the next one.

I liked but didn't love this title. It was a good read at the time but not one that stayed with me with passing time.

I just love Faith Martin and the way she writes. Excellent book. Brilliant story and I loved the main characters. I would highly recommend this book.

Interesting book slow at first then gets interesting. A murder happens in the village a young boy. A young boy with a history of being bad. Who has done it ? The sister who hates him? The dad? The mum? Best friend? DI have to put together all the stories to find the truth before its too late.

EXCERPT: He was a big lad, but not fat, with dark hair and what she thought might be blue eyes. He might be as old as an under-developed sixteen, or as young as a well-developed thirteen, it was hard to tell. He was dressed in dark blue tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt. The logo was hard to make out, mostly due to the fact that he had a pair of garden shears sticking out of his chest. The dark stain of blood had pooled into his lap, but very little had made it to the floor. And from that alone she surmised that his heart must have stopped beating almost immediately. She had hoped so anyway, the poor little bugger.

THE BLURB: 15–year-old Billy Davies is found dead in his father’s shed. A pair of gardening shears thrust brutally into his chest.

DI Hillary Greene tries to get to the bottom of this baffling crime.

How had Billy come into contact with such a vicious killer? Who wanted him dead and why? The investigation reveals that the teenager was not such an innocent young man.

Meanwhile, Hillary’s having a tough time at work. She’s been passed over for promotion, and her reliable constable Tommy Lynch is to be transferred out. But Hillary won’t let distractions get in the way of solving crimes.

To catch this killer, Hillary will need to dig deep into the dark secrets of a small community.

PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A REVISED EDITION OF A BOOK FIRST PUBLISHED AS “THROUGH A NARROW DOOR. "

MY THOUGHTS: Who would want to stick a pair of gardening shears into the chest of a fifteen year old boy? A good question. And there are multiple possible answers. DI Hillary Greene is tasked with solving the crime.

Although this is #5 in the DI Hillary Greene series, it works well as a stand alone read.

Murder in the Family could almost be classed as a cosy murder mystery. There is no overt violence, no sexual content and, I 'm afraid, not much in the way of suspense either. While I didn't find this particularly suspenseful, it was still a good read. Faith Martin has created interesting and realistic characters and a plot with plenty of red herrings and suspects. She has a good balance between the investigative story, and the personal lives of the characters. She writes humorously at times - I loved the name of Hillary’s ancient Volkswagen, Puff the Tragic Wagon.

I would have liked a little more suspense, and I felt that the ending was a little rushed. Otherwise it was a good solid read, if nothing particularly special. Would I read other titles in the series? Yes, it was an easy, undemanding and enjoyable read. 3.5 stars.

One more thing, I much prefer the books original title, Through A Narrow Door. It somehow seems more mysterious.

Thank you to Joffe Books via Netgalley for providing a digital copy of Murder in the Family by Faith Martin for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

This is the fifth book in the best selling series featuring DI Hilary Greene and her team. It’s also the fifth book by this author that I have absolutely loved but more about that in a bit.

At the beginning of the book, DI Greene is actually acting Detective Chief Inspector. I got the impression that DI Greene isn’t so much bothered about losing out on the permanent promotion, but she is bothered about the person who she lost it to as there is a history of ill feeling between the two of them. DI Greene has been feeling a bit swamped by the amount of paperwork that comes with the role of a Detective Chief Inspector and that is one thing that she won’t regret giving up. She has also been missing the investigation role that she has as a Detective Inspector. When she is acting up, she has her own little office, where she is on her own and she feels left out of the loop as regards the normal day to day banter that her team usually share. Hillary is still a bit of a loner, who seems to much prefer her own company than mixing with people. Hillary works well with her team, who seem to have her back but there are two individuals that she doesn’t seem to trust- Frank and Lauren. Hillary is a feisty, independent lady, who is in her forties. DI Greene is determined and she tells it like it is. She certainly speaks her mind. DI Greene does more than her fair share of the workload and is always happy to muck in if somebody needs help. This case seems to get to her more than most because it is the brutal murder of a 15 year old boy, still a child in so many ways. The young age of the victim strengthens DI Greene’s determination to get to the truth, to solve the case and apprehend the murderer before anybody else is killed. There were two characters that I really didn’t take to and I could quite cheerfully have slapped them around the face with a wet flip flop and a wet fish. Of course I am talking about the characters of Frank and Lauren. Frank has got to be the laziest, most chauvinistic waste of space ever to walk the earth. To be honest it is beyond me how he is still a serving police officer as he has some pretty unpleasant views, which are abhorrent in today’s police service and he never does his fair share of the work. Lauren is a bit of a tart, who was in an affair with one of Hillary’s bosses and she thought that this would afford her some extra privileges- wrong!!! Her lover breaks off the affair as he wants promotion, but he knows that he is unlikely to get it if he is still with her. Lauren certainly uses her femininity to get what she wants.

Once again, and as I have found the rest of the books in this series, I found ‘Murder In The Family’ to be superbly written and unputdownable (not sure if that is a word or not but it is now). I don’t mean that my Kindle was glued to my hand, because it wasn’t, but I found that when I started reading the book I just couldn’t stop. Reading ‘Murder In The Family’ became seriously addictive and I just had to read one more chapter and then another and so on and so forth. I was so engrossed in the story that I didn’t realise how quickly the pages were turning. In fact, it was almost as if they were turning themselves and before I knew it I had finished the book, which I was so disappointed about. I was enjoying the writing style and the reunion with old friends and enemies so much that I just wanted the book to continue. Reading this book was a bit like riding on a rollercoaster ride with all the twists, turns and stomach churning moments. Several times I almost had to read through my fingers as I genuinely feared what was going to happen next. More than once I thought that I had fathomed out who the murderer was but of course I was completely wrong and the murderer was somebody else entirely. Oops The author perfectly captured the small village mentality, where all the villagers are suspicious of in comers and they don’t like outsiders interfering in village life. Not only that but the small village seems to be full of drama, intrigue and downright scandalous happenings.

In short, I loved reading ‘Murder In The Family’ and I can’t wait to read what comes next from the talented, but slightly twisted, pen of Faith Martin. I would recommend this series to anybody. The score on the board for this book is a whopping 5* out of 5*.

Thank you Net Galley. My second read in the Hilary Greene series and this one was better than the first. This is an interesting series and the characters are very interesting. A great read for weekends.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Joffe Books for a review copy of Murder in the Family, the fifth book to feature DI Hillary Greene of Thames Valley Police.

The novel opens with a bang as Hillary doesn't get the DCI role she has been doing for the past 5 months. It's disappointing but as she was unsure she really liked the DCI role she is happy to dive back into investigating the murder of 15 year old Billy Davies, found in his dad's allotment shed with a pair of gardening shears in his chest. The case is puzzling as it initially seems motiveless but careful investigation uncovers a host of suspects.

I thoroughly enjoyed Murder in the Family which is another good addition to a series which is becoming a firm favourite with me. It is not a taxing read but is sufficiently complicated to hold my attention throughout, wondering what would come next. I like the format which has a linear timeline and Hillary's point of view as I really like the challenge of trying to get there before Hillary and her team (needless to say I failed!) with the same information they have. The solution is ingenious but the motive seems slightly outdated (I can't say more without spoilers).

My real pleasure from this series lies, however, in the ongoing saga of Hillary's life. With her ex husband's ill gotten gains now consigned, if not to the history books then certainly the back burner, it would seem that she is ready for a fresh start but this brings more dilemmas. It is compulsive reading and I'm itching to know what Ms Martin has in store for her next. The rest of the team is not standing still either and change is in the air. I've come to really enjoy the team dynamic with their petty squabbles, different hopes and aspirations and unacknowledged dependence on Hillary for guidance and leadership.

I have no hesitation in recommending Murder in the Family as a good read.

The job Hillary has now is a promotion but she's bored. Supervising and pushing paper is not her thing. She doesn't mind training new officers but she'd rather be doing investigations than paperwork. When she gets her wish and is sent back to investigations, she finds they are replacing her with the cop that tried to put her in jail for her dead husband's crime. She's not happy, but she doesn't have time to think about it. She gets assigned a new murder case right away...

Joffe and Net Galley let me read this book for review (thank you). It has been published so you can grab a copy now.

Hillary finds the victim is a fifteen-year old boy. Someone has stabbed him with gardening shears that were in the shed where he was located. It's a lonely sad death. Why kill him?

It takes time for that question to be answered. He wasn't involved in drugs, he wasn't stealing and he didn't seem to have other bad habits. But most people referred to him as sly. And he had money he had no way to earn. Just what was he doing?

It turns out this little community had some secrets. The young man had a camera and he liked to take pictures. He even got an award for one of them. But the other pictures he took were of things people did and didn't want other people to know.

This is a look at the darker side of life and it's not pleasant. Hillary does find out who the murderer is. But she's got another problem. She's got two men who are interested in her. She wasn't sure if she wanted one, but two is too many. I wonder what will happen in the next book...

I am a massive fan of the DI Hilary Greene Series and can’t wait for each new one to be r-released by Joffe Books every other week.

As with the previous books you do not need to have read any of them before this one but it makes a lot more sense if you do as we are now 5 books into the series and most of the characters back stories have been told in previous books. This being said there are still lots of references to the previous books to help any new readers catch up with the characters history and back stories.

As this is book 5 of the series we know what we are going to get out of the book and it doesn’t disappoint. Hilary Greene has now been made acting DCI with DCI Mallow now being promoted as well.

This story starts with a young boy being found murdered with a pair of garden shears stuck in his chest and no witnesses or suspects to go on.

When Hilary starts investigating the murder her team have very little to go on, but she starts working her way systematically through all of the suspects, throwing up red herrings and false leads left, right and centre, to put us readers off the scent of the real murderer until the very end.

The book is very well written and a nice easy read with enough twists and turns throughout to want you to keep reading long after you should have stopped as it is such a great read you just want to read one more chapter.

I was left guessing all the way through until the very last chapter, and I can’t wait to find out what happens in the next chapter of Hilary and her team’s lives.

Overall yet another fantastic book from Faith and worthy of 5 stars from me.

I am really loving this series and I think that  the books are getting better and better as the series progresses - this is book 5 and the series shows no signs of slowing down!

The plot in this book is excellent and it kept me gripped. It has the same excellent attention to detail and great writing style as in the previous books and I think this is the main thing for me that makes the series so good,  that and Faith has created some great characters in the lead roles - five stars from me and I am already looking forward to book 6!

Murder in the Family by Faith Martin is book 5 in the DI Hillary Greene series. (First published as Through a Narrow Door).

This book was great, I thoroughly enjoyed it, it was full of suspense and twists that kept me engaged right the way through the book. I was “into” it right from the first page and had a hard job putting it down. I thought the story was clever and very interesting, I never would have guessed the bad guy or the twist at the end in a million years.

I have enjoyed all the books in the series so far but I think that each new book gets better and better. I like the characters, the way that everyone hates Frank and the area that the stories are set in. It all just seems to work together to create an interesting and intriguing series of books.

I was kind of disappointed to finish the book because I didn’t have the next one in the series to start! Can I have the next one please!

I think that this book could be read as a stand-alone novel but I would recommend reading the series in order as you get to know the background of the team of detectives. They have quite complex relationships with each other which grows and develops with each book.

I don’t hesitate in giving Murder in the Family 5 stars, it was a really entertaining read that I enjoyed very much.

5 stars

Acting DCI Hillary Greene goes into the office expecting a normal day. She is hit with a bombshell when she learns that she is no longer the DCI. Paul Danvers was selected. He was the officer who investigated her connection to her n’er-do-well and crooked cop husband Ronnie. DC Tommy Lynch was promoted to DS and offered a position at another city nearby. Hillary will be very sorry to see him go, but is happy for him at the same time.

Fifteen-year old Billy Davies is found dead in his father’s allotment shed. He was stabbed through the heart with a scissors. He was found by his eleven-year old sister who is naturally very upset. The house is very isolated and initial interviews of neighbors reveals that no one has seen anything. Billy was heavily into photography and was very good at it.

When DI Hillary Greene and DS Janine Tyler interview his best friend, they learn that they weren’t very close any longer. The former friend gives them the name of a Lester Miller as Billy’s current best friend. Hillary and Janine will interview him next. Meanwhile, DS Frank Ross is still trying to discover what happened to the money that Hillary’s dead former cop husband had squirreled away. He’s also trying to get some dirt on the new DCI Paul Danvers.

When interviewing past and present teachers, a different picture of Billy comes to the fore. He was a selfish and subtle bully. He believed that the world owed him. He was clever, sly and selfish. He wanted to be a paparazzi and get rich. It looks like Billy’s secret has something to do with his photography. Billy’s girlfriend Heather Soames goes missing and the tension in our story increases.

The identity of the murderer was somewhat of a surprise, but the motive came as a big one.

This is a very well written and plotted novel. It is Faith Martin’s best book thus far. I really like DI Hillary Greene and DC Tommy Lynch. DS Janine Tyler not so much, but it’s more her entitled attitude (because of her looks?) that bugs me. She does, however, admire Hillary’s techniques and insights. The most irritating member of the team is DS Frank Ross. Yukkers! I appreciate the way the team gets along, especially Hillary and Tommy. The suspense in the story begins immediately and does not let up until the explosive ending. I like the way Ms. Martin injects a bit of humor in her story and her writing is straightforward and an easy read.

I want to thank NetGalley and Joffe Books for forwarding to me a copy of this really great book to read and enjoy.

I enjoyed this book. Hillary Greene is a detective based in Kidlington, and much of the story takes place in locations that I know, which makes it more interesting to read. The characters are well written and the story develops at a fast pace. I recommend it. Thanks to NetGalley for a preview copy.

I enjoyed this book and read it pretty quickly but I did not love it. It was lacking something, however I cannot put my finger on exactly what it was that was missing. But a good story nonetheless. Maybe it's because there are other books in the series and this is the first that I have read. But it is worth reading .

4.5 Stars

MURDER IN THE FAMILY, a treat for lovers of British Crime, sees the return of DI Hillary Greene in her fifth suspenseful romp set in Oxfordshire.

For DI Greene, there's almost nothing worse than finding the murdered body of an elderly person... but finding a 15=year-old boy dead with a pair of gardening shears sticking out of his chest is the worst.

Who would have wanted this young boy dead? and Why? He had never been in trouble..nothing beyond normal teenage activities. Or is that the real story?

What Greene and her team find when investigating is that there are secrets in this small community .. and everyone lies.

DI Greene is a terrific series character. She's older, dedicated to her job, and not afraid to speak her mind. She's known for her persistence and knowing how to interrogate suspects to get at the truth. Her team is quite credible ... the DC who's leaving for another post shortly, another DC who may have her eyes on their new boss, and then there's Frank. Not even sure how to describe him, but he's always around and he and Green absolutely do not like each other.

There are plenty of suspects to zero in ... starting with the victim's family and expanding to their jobs and the neighbors, to his girl friend who is definitely keeping secrets from her father.

This is a well written crime thriller. I always recommend starting at the beginning of a series, but this one does well as a stand alone. Each books seems to be better than the last.

Many thanks to the author / Joffe Books / Netgalley for the advance copy of this British crime thriller. Opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

Thank you Netgalley and Joffe Books for the eARC.
The DI Hillary Greene series just gets better and better and I want to thank Joffe Books for republishing these books, I love them! And luckily there are many more to come (at least I hope so).
This time a 15-year old boy is found stabbed to death by garden shears in his father's shed, found by his little sister.
As Hillary and the team find out in due course, the boy was not just an innocent kid. He was spending a lot of money, despite his modest background and they investigate the drugs angle, but without luck. How was he able to buy an extremely expensive bike as well as gold jewelry for his girlfriend? By the time his neighbors have been questioned, the answer is clear...
Hillary is a 40 something, strong and extremely capable woman who lives on a narrow boat. Her team consists of a young, pretty sergeant who is very ambitious, an older cop who is lazy and spiteful and a new boss, Paul Danvers, the detective who previously investigated Hillary, believing her to be bent...not the most auspicious of events.
I didn't guess the ending, which I loved. Again, this book can be read as a standalone, but do yourselves a favor - read from the start of the series!

My review as posted on Goodreads:

Having just read and really liked 'Murder in the Village' I was very keen to read this, the fifth book in the DI Hillary Greene series.

Once again the Oxfordshire locations and strong characterisation helped to create a novel with a strong sense of time and geography.

It was first published under the title 'Through a Narrow Door '.

This story picks up from the earlier book. However it is stronger in several ways. Most importantly, I liked the quality of the dialogue which added both humour and a sense of reality in the work place.

Faith Martin, cleverly introduces her suspects and creates several red herrings before the final reveal!

I would like to have discovered this series at the beginning. However having read two of the stories, I can see that each is able to stand alone on its own merit.

My advice, read the series in order if you get the chance.

My thanks to Netgalley and Joffe Books for a copy in return for this review.