Gallowstree Lane by Kate London

Genre: Crime/Thriller
Source: Random Things Tours
Rating: 4/5
Amazon

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About The Book

Detective Inspector Kieran Shaw’s not interested in the infantry. Shaw likes the proper criminals, the ones who can plan things.
For two years he’s been painstakingly building evidence against an organized network, the Eardsley Bluds. Operation Perseus is about to make its arrests.
So when a low-level Bluds member is stabbed to death on Gallowstree Lane, Shaw’s priority is to protect his operation. An investigation into one of London’s tit for tat killings can’t be allowed to derail Perseus and let the master criminals go free.
But there’s a witness to the murder, fifteen-year-old Ryan Kennedy. Already caught up in Perseus and with the Bluds, Ryan’s got his own demons and his own ideas about what’s important.
As loyalties collide and priorities clash, a chain of events is triggered that draws in Shaw’s old adversary DI Sarah Collins and threatens everyone with a connection to Gallowstree Lane…

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My Thoughts

This is a non-stop crime book that will get you gripped since the last page; because in the gangs world you never know if you’ll be the next victim in their war…
This had been a twisted procedural case; the police will have their hands full with a teenage that had been stabbed linked to a big case to stop one of the biggest gangs in London. So, on one side there’s DI Sarah Collins that is trying to discover who was the stabbed teenager and his missing friend and on the other side we have DC Lizzie Griffiths that had been assigned to help in a secret operation called Perseus. They don’t like each other, but they respect their work, and even if they are not allowed to they will try to help their respective cases.
I really liked Sarah, she knows she is putting her work before her life, but at the same time she is tenacious and like a bulldog with a bone when she smells a clue! I didn’t like much Lizzie, but maybe because I don’t know neither her story, she seems to be really good in her job, but she seems overwhelmed on her personal life…
I am always surprised when the police are ready to leave a killer if they can close a big case instead, I don’t think it’s fair for the victims or their families, but I’ve seen/read so many cases that this is what happens that I suppose reality is not so far from fiction… quite disappointing to say at least.
This had been a race against the clock, in the beginning the story is paused, but then the clock starts ticking and all the action evolves so quick that the ending is not disappointing at all, but bittersweet.
I haven’t read any of the previous cases of Collins and Griffiths series, you can read this book as standalone; but I am sure that if you read this one you’ll want to read all the other ones!
Ready for a trip to Gallowstree Lane?

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About The Author

Kate graduated from Cambridge University and moved to Paris where she trained in theatre. In 2006 Kate joined the Metropolitan Police Service.
Like all police officers she started in uniform, working for two years on a response team, and then moved into the CID. She qualified as a detective constable then went on attachment with the police nationale in France and finished her career working as part of a Major Investigation Team on SC&01 – the Metropolitan Police Service’s Homicide Command.
She resigned from the MPS in August 2014. Post Mortem is her first novel.