4.5 stars

This was a very fun and interesting story to follow. The murders and the whole mystery around them was really well done and it held my attention from start to finish. I loved that we got chapters from Harlow's past, as well as short chapters from the killer's perspective. Overall, this was a well done book, and now I'm eagerly waiting for new adventures with Detective Harlow.

The narrator of this audiobook did a wonderful job, and I would recommend everyone who wants to read this book to pick up the audiobook.

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Harlow Durant is the daughter of a serial killer. The thing that hunted her and kept her on the run.

A missing girl was found dead under the snow. Another one. And then another one. A serial killer was killing college girls.

The story was ok. Harlow is an intreging character with her dark past and her fear of becoming like her father who she worshiped. Her personality is what I like and the reason why I would love to read more of her story.

And the end was the best that could be. Left my mouth hung open 😮

***ARC provided by the publisher via Netgalley.co.uk in return for an honest review ***

Harlow Durant is a homicide detective. Her rule is that she never stays in one place too long. Her latest assignment finds her in New York County partnered with missing persons detective, Lucas.
As the snow falls the body count begins to climb and Harlow's past comes back to haunt her.

I really enjoyed this audiobook. It was a good solid whodunit thriller. My only nitpick would be that, as a woman, I felt that the idea of "women hating" men was taken a little too far, especially given that the only likeable male character turned out to be a gay man. I'm certainly not one to jump on the "not all men" bandwagon but at times this felt a little too preachy.

Apart from that it was great. It is possible to have a strong female lead that isn't hated by every male character that she encounters. It's a pity that this detracted from an otherwise great book.

In the book Find Me In The Dark, author Dea Poirier writes about Detective Harlow Durant, who is trying to escape the shadow of her serial killer dad. But even changing her name has not seemed to help. But when the snow begins to melt, the body of a missing college student is found in a snowbank. As the snow melts even more, another body is found. A new snowstorm is coming and Detective Durant and her partner Detective Lucas Park must hurry before the killer strikes again!
This was a great edge of your seat story. The narration was well done. I would recommend this book. I received a copy of this audio-book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Every wonder what happens to the children of the serial killers we see plastered across the media? Well after bouncing through foster families, constant moves, and a few name changes, Harlow Durant ends up as a state detective in NY working homicide. Now she’s hunting down killers and trying to hide her identity.

This book was captivating and the ending was such a hanger. Looking forward to the next one in the series!

Audiobook review - Find Me in the Dark, Dea Poirer.

⭐️⭐️

Honestly, I was just disappointed in it if anything. It’s a perfectly good story and well written, it just lacked uniqueness. I feel like my expectations were so high based on the description and it just didn’t quite hit them. An average murder-mystery, crime book at best.

Detective Harlow Durant, the daughter of a well-known serial killer, is given the case of a murder. She discovers the body has been there for quite some time so begins exploring missing person reports and identifies the body as a college student, Alyssa.

Soon after, another body is found. Someone who knew Alyssa. The murders have to be linked but how? Are there going to be more victims?

Honestly, the concept of a serial killer’s daughter as a detective was what brought me to this book. I thought it was such a unique concept and would make for an original plot. I was disappointed. It just didn’t go anywhere. It was mentioned now and again but I wanted that to be the central focus - the college student deaths bored me. It was so… typical! Throughout the whole audiobook I found my thoughts drifting away. I could not keep engaged with this. I completely lost interest. By the end, I was listening to it on 1.5x speed just to get through it! The narration didn’t help with this.

Regarding the characters, I honestly can’t say I know much about them. I don’t even think I remembered Detective Harlow’s name until the last third of the book. This is what failed me. I was drawn in by the concept of a dark back story with the serial killer father and then didn’t learn a whole lot about the character! I felt no connection with them whatsoever and therefore just didn’t care.

Overall, I think I just expected too much from the book. I really liked the concept but it ended up falling flat for me. Just another murder mystery book unfortunately. 🙁

Thank you to Bookouture Audio for my copy of these via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Detective Harlow Durant is the daughter of an infamous serial killer and because of this she is bounced around from case to case and is always untrusted despite her talents in her field of work. Harlow as a character is hit or miss due to her big personality and strong opinions and all the walls she out up to avoid connections to others. The unfolding of the mystery was done well and so where the underlying themes of the difficulties woman face in law enforcement and the mishandling of cases deemed unimportant.

As Detective Harlow Durant is working on her newest case, that of a young woman's body found lying in the snow, she discovered some interesting facts. Not only was it clear that the woman had been there for quite some time, facts proved that the woman had been living a secret life. On the one hand she was a hard-working student, someone who got along with everyone. On the other hand, her tutor says the victim was a different woman than others saw.

Leading a secret life is something that is not new to Harlow. As her father is currently imprisoned as a convicted serial killer, Harlow herself kept a lot hidden. As she pushes through the current investigation, she remembers snippets of her past, and the story goes between past and present. Then, another student is found and Harlow is certain that there is a connection between the two women. Can Harlow find the killer before there is another victim? And, how much of Harlow's past impacts what is going on in her life now?

What a riveting story! Whether sensing the danger the victims were about to face or reading of Harlow's violent past, the impact was huge. Chilling. It helped that Harlow has a wonderful new partner named Lucas Park and it was interesting to watch them strike a balance in their new working relationship. What made this already fabulous book even better was the excellent audiobook narration. I could not put this book down, leaving me excited for this first book in a new series. I love Harlow and cannot wait to see her face future cases.

Many thanks to Bookouture and to NetGalley for this ARC for review. This is my honest opinion.

I spent the entire book feeling a dejavoux that harkns many other tales. This is neither a praise nor a comdemnation. Just an observation. I felt I had lived this life, scaled these walls, and solved this case before. It was comforting. It was not ground breaking.

In this police crime / mystery / suspense story, we are presented with a main character that has a heavy past still being carried, making her angry, biased, and opinionated. I didn't find her likable or relatable. Bodies keep turning up in snowbanks throughout the sleepy little town, after many missing female reports go ignored.
While I believe the main character, and her partner Lucas have prospects in future novels, this one fell a little short of WOWing me to be lured into the next in series.
The audio narration and performance by Lisa Rost-Welling was very good.
Thank you to NetGalley, Bookouture Audio, and Dea Poirier for the advanced listening copy. Opinions are my own.

In the first installment of a new detective series, we meet Harlow Durant, a special investigator who arrives on scene in Plattsburg, NY to assist the Bureau of Criminal Investigation in the murder of college student Alyssa Trent. Alyssa's parents describe her as a dedicated student with no enemies, but her tutor claims Alyssa had a secret life--and she's not the only one. Detective Durant is not only the sole female working in a testosterone-heavy upstate NY police department. She's the daughter of a convicted serial killer. Working overtime to investigate the murder and conceal her troubled past, Durant has to learn to work with her new partner, Lucas Park, who only recently transferred to Homicide from Missing Persons, while dealing with threats from another police officer who's taken a strong disliking to her. And then another female student is found in the thawing snow, leading Durant to suspect she's dealing with a killer like her father.

This book is a decent introduction to a new character, one who has a complex and intriguing background that provides motivation for her to solve homicide cases. Durant's traumatic past leads her to be opinionated and often defensive, initially mistrusting her new partner, and leading her to jump into harm's way more than once. At times her internal dialogue became rather intrusive, and listening to the audiobook I often had trouble telling when she was actually speaking to someone and when she was thinking to herself. As the only female detective at the department, she points out the realistic fraternity-like environment often plaguing the police, along with the high-school style politics.

Be aware this is more of a police procedural than a thriller. As a procedural, it's quite accurate and detailed. But it's unlikely the reader will be able to predict who the killer is as they're only shown once in the book. Durant receives several death threats, but by the end of the book it's still unclear who sent them, and that likely ties into the cliffhanger ending. Flashbacks depict Durant's past history with her parents (and her mother was far from Parent of the Year as well) that tell us more about Durant, but don't tie in to the current case. Possibly her past is connected to the death threats and/or the ending, but we won't know that until the next book at least.

Overall, this is a good launch to a series, and I'm intrigued to find out more about Detective Durant. It just went on sale so it's a great time to jump on board. Thanks to Netgalley, Bookouture, and the author for the opportunity to read it.

I enjoyed the book. It was a standard police investigating book, which is the kind of book I like. The characters were interesting. Harlow has got an interesting background. I think she should not move. She and Lucas make a great team. I like the twist at the end. I listened to the audiobook and thought the narrator was very good.

I'm my opinion, this book was a pretty basic legal thriller/mystery. Nothing really stood out. Great narrator!

𝘚𝘩𝘰𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘦𝘯𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨!

I love a good police procedural and this one kept me at the edge of my seat.
It was dark, twisty, disturbing, nail-biting, suspenseful and that end, just wow!

Thank you NetGalley and Bookouture for this ALC.

𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦: 𝘔𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘺, 𝘛𝘩𝘳𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘳𝘴, 𝘚𝘶𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘦, 𝘊𝘳𝘪𝘮𝘦, 𝘚𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘒𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘳𝘴, 𝘗𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘗𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘥𝘶𝘳𝘢𝘭𝘴.

https://www.instagram.com/booksandcoffeemx/

Thank you to @deapoirierbooks and @bookouture for this advanced audio copy of Find Me in the Dark in return for an honest review.

Description 🔖

The body of a young woman is found in the melting snow in Plattsburgh, New York and Detective Harlow Durant is given the case. She soon learns that the body has lain there for months so begins to dig her way through missing person reports. The body is identified as Alyssa Trent who was a college student and according to her family, had no enemies and nobody who would wish her harm. Her college lecturers think differently though and believe that Alyssa was leading a double life.

Not long after, another body is found in the thawing snow and the victims knew each other. They are definitely linked, but how? Who would want these girls dead? And how long does Durant have before this killer takes another innocent life?

General Thoughts 🤔

Ok, I’m going to struggle with this review. This book and I did not get along well. I hate it when this happens as it makes me feel so bad, but not everyone is supposed to love every book are they. And what works for some people doesn’t work for others.

I couldn’t keep on track with the story as my mind just kept drifting away elsewhere. The story wasn’t engaging enough for me and I felt that the beginning of the book dragged quite a lot with nothing much actually happening. I can’t say for certain whether this was the writing or the narration (or a combination of both) but by the time I hit the middle of the book, my heart wasn’t in it and the last half of the book felt like I was listening for the sake of getting to the end rather than because I was interested.

Characters 👭👬👫

I can’t report back a lot about the characters because I don’t know an awful lot about them. What I do know is that I could not get on board with Detective Durant. Her constant comments about being the only female and constant outbursts about how unfairly she was treated because she was a female kind of got annoying. Once or twice would have been fine but I started to feel like this was all this detective was going to care about rather than getting on and solving a case.

The plot line about Durant and her father had the potential to be great, but unfortunately I was so detached from the characters and the story, it didn’t land with me in the way that would have made me love this book.

Writing Style ✍️

As I mentioned earlier in this review, the beginning was far too slow for me. I don’t need every book to grab me right from the off and I do enjoy a slow burner but I felt like nothing happened at all. I think a lot of the first half of the book could have been stripped out and more focus put into the investigation once more bodies started to turn up.

I also thought there was a lot of repetition through the book. I don’t know if it was because the author was really trying to make a point or whether it was because the story didn’t flow incredibly well, so we had to keep going over old ground.

Conclusion & Scoring 🎖️

Obviously, this book and I are not a match made in heaven, but there is someone out there for everyone so I’m sure that there are lots of readers who will love this. I would never discourage anyone from picking up a book and giving it a go so I would recommend that if this book has caught your attention, read it and try it for yourself. I’d be really interested to know how other readers find it.

was really excited when I got excepted for this ark on net galley.

By the time I was in the second chapter I wasn much less infused

And now having finished it yeah no.
It’s just not for me.

I don’t know it’s just boring it seems to get even more so.
The further you go
I think maybe it’s the tone that is written in it just doesn’t work for me with there’s nothing wrong with me with Facebook I just
Was very mad about the whole thing

Thinking of Nageli for sending me this review copy

Find Me in the Dark - Dea Poirier
Narrated by Lisa Rost-Welling

I received an advance review copy for free thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture and I am leaving this review voluntarily

She’d been running for so long, it felt like her legs were on fire. Her heart was pounding so hard, she was sure it would give out. Around her, the snow was falling, casting an eerie silence over the town. A crack behind her, a foot snapping a branch, it warned her that he was still coming. She whipped around and saw the knife gleaming in his hand…

As the snow begins to melt across Plattsburgh, New York, the body of a young woman is found buried in a snowbank. When Detective Harlow Durant arrives at the scene she discovers that the victim has lain there for months: her arresting beauty, brightly-coloured nails and a distinctive gold bracelet perfectly preserved in the ice.

This dark and violent story introduces Detective Harlow Durant and her new partner Lucas. We witness this story through the eyes of Harlow and it very clear that we are missing large chunks of Harlow's past which should become apparent in the upcoming books.

I very much enjoyed this audiobook and thought that Lisa Rost-Welling did a wonderful job. Dea has left this book on a cliff hanger, ensuring that you feel the need to read onto the next book in the series.

Another page turner … although I listened to the audiobook, so another compulsive listen with a pretty good narrator too.
This was a great read right till nearly the end where I felt a little rushed. In fact I had to listen to a few bits again as I felt I had missed something. Nice little twist on the last ‘page’.
Nice!

What an angry character, deeply in need of therapy. Totally dislikable, the Harlow/Harley – the main character – is living under the delusion that in the eyes of the world she cannot do her job because her father was a serial killer. Why she believed this is never explained, but a major driving force in her overall dysfunction. Additionally, her anger directed mostly at men, but humanity in general is annoying and off-putting. She over-reacts to pretty much everything, seeing the slightest glance as some kind of provocation.

Ms. Poirier’s obsession with all men being sexual predators is another major problem with the book. She developed a story where every man in it is horrible. Comments like it isn’t safe for women anywhere takes it over the top. The theme is so prevalent in the story it overpowers the actual storyline.
Beyond these issues, the story was good. It was well developed and flowed along as a who-dunnit giving the reader the opportunity to gather clues and piece them together. I doubt the clues would hold up in a real investigation, they just didn’t feel that strong or cohesive. The cadence of the story was jarring. Building drama, excitement and then, as though being slammed into a wall everything was quiet and back to normal.

2.5⭐️
I loved this cover and didn’t love the book. And here’s why. The main characters was unlikable. She was anger and over opinionated. In the beginning I felt like it really dragged and almost stopped listening all together. I get that things were hard for her but I needed more. What really happened between her and her dad? It also felt very rushed in a lot of parts that needed more detail, more relationship.
Not for me.
Thanks Bookouture via Netgalley.