Reviews

I just read @johnreidauthor last book and I have to tell you that it’s my favorite! After this week I was in need of a ‘dose of a good book’! In this new mystery, DCI Steve Burt finds himself immersed in two deaths that, although they don’t seem to be connected, are more than we thought! We have murders, corruption and an attempt at world domination! This is the perfect book for mystery lovers and it will hold us from beginning to end! I highly advise you to read this book, you won’t regret it!

DCI Steve Burt has had a quiet time of late when a report comes in about a headless body washed up by the river Thames. The post mortem has been inconclusive leaving only a head injury as the cause of death and little to go on for identification other than a small tattoo. Meanwhile in Norfolk a policewoman has been found murdered. She was due to retire soon and despite a long career looked like few would have been after her especially in a rural setting. For several reasons Steve and Matt are seconded in to assist, for Steve this is with a view to his future. Two businessmen with business on the wrong side of the law are looking to expand their little empire and have an invitation which could make them very rich if things go according to plan. If not they could be feeding the fishes, but what could go wrong when there is so much money at stake? I quickly got into this and it's the first one in the series I have read so happily stands alone (as do the others I understand). I liked the tenacity and determination of Steve and his team and had to smile at the rather laid back crew they initially had to work with. There is a good mix of plot and a little backstory for the main characters which to me adds depth and I felt as if I quickly “ got to know them” and their well roundedness shone through, to me showing the skill of a brilliant author. A clever, very well thought out plot with twists and turns along the way which kept the grey matter nicely active. A wonderful entertaining read.

I’m a latecomer to the DCI Burt series, having just finished The Norwich Murders, the sixth in the series by John Reid. The book was offered to me some time ago but somehow it fell through the cracks and I temporarily forgot I had it and just got in to it this month. There is much I liked about this novel and there is a lot going on here. It begins with a simple murder, like any proper British crime fiction novel, but quickly becomes a fascinating mixture of murder investigations, international crime syndicates, and political corruption in high places. John Reid offers here one of the most expansive, intricate, and imaginative crime fiction plots I’ve read in a long while and I’m only sorry I didn’t get to this novel sooner. It’s a cracking good read, especially for those of us who enjoy reading proper British crime mysteries and thrillers.

Fans of intriguing crime writer John Reid will be delighted DCI Steve Burt’s latest seemingly unsolvable case, which splits the Special Resolutions team split between Norwich and London.

Juxtaposing contemporary issues of UK and European drug running and prostitution rings with the ancient villain of La Cosa Nostra, The Norwich Murders immerses fans in the company of familiar characters and a compelling new back-story for his beloved literary DCI. With a question mark surrounding how to join the murderous and corruption centric dots, The Norwich Murders leaves fans transfixed and wanting more.

you know he researched this well every detail and each murder down to the investigation and the characters building was accurate. You get to know how they ask question to the characters like he make you feel that you are interviewing the characters with him. It’s a great book. This is the third book in the DCI Burt series by John Reid and the only one I’ve read so far. You do not need to have read the first two in order to be able to follow the story - it works well as a standalone read.

Being the third in the series I thought I may feel a bit lost however you can definitely read this as a stand-alone as the characters are introduced well and the plot is new to this book. I did find this slow in parts with lots of characters in the mix and I wanted to shout at the team when I’d made links before they had! However, it was a clever storyline full of corruption, twists and risk taking. DCI Burt and his team are likeable characters and It is easy to picture them and their relationships from the descriptions given. I’d be interested in reading more of the DCI Burt mysteries and it strikes me as a series that would transfer well to television!

I am so obsessed with this series and every time a new one comes out I have to read it. So I was really looking forward to reading another instalment in the DCI Burt series.

I don't read many crime thrillers but John Reid has a way with creating this crime fiction world really well that seems so realistic. The way you fall into the story, it's easy to get swept away. It plays out like a TV series and the characters are so well created all of it has a realism to it. I've said this before but it's absolutely true!

I was so hooked reading The Revenge, I was hoping for answers regarding Poppy - who is so sadly missed! I really enjoyed the way this story played out. I couldn't believe the twists, the dark operations and I was definitely gasping in shock. I loved our new criminal; Charlie. I was on tender hooks as to how his story was going to pan out and our new Sergeant Si, was fun to read, I enjoyed how he was just there to get his early retirement until things perked up.

I found myself engrossed in this novel and I couldn't put it down. I love this series and I highly recommend it.

I have thoroughly enjoyed John Reid’s previous DCI Steve Burt Mystery novels, so I was really excited to read The Watchers. Per usual, I was not disappointed! It is a standalone, but there are recurring characters, and I’ve enjoyed reading the others.

The recurring characters in this series are so familiar now, it’s like getting together with old friends. They are quirky and so well-developed, they make the reading experience that much more enjoyable.

Police Procedurals can be hit or miss for me, but John Reid knows what he is doing with this story. I enjoyed the mystery and the pacing of the story kept me invested from beginning to end. I thoroughly enjoyed The Watchers and recommend giving it a read!

Mr. Reid has penned an unputdownable crime/police procedural novel. The three detectives may have been on their way out, but they had such tenacity and determination. I was rooting for all of them as they attempted to solve the “perfect” crime. The storyline held me captive from beginning to end. I NEEDED to know who the killer was. And, the twist at the end was perfection.

If you enjoy challenging your sleuthing abilities with a compelling, suspenseful crime novel, then I recommend you grab a copy of The Forgotten Gun. Also, a caveat: there is a lot of coffee drinking going on throughout this tale, so brew yourself a big pot because once you start reading, you won’t want to stop.

The Voice was a fantastic read, it was so fast paced, the time frame set out with the dates was a perfect addition to the storyline and it really felt I was living the days with them. I felt like I had it all playing out like a movie in my head - it was that good!! There were so many cases going on and at first I did wonder if I was going to get tangled up in it all but I didn't, it was so easy to follow. The realism of this book was profound and though I'm no police expert (- even with the amount of crime shows I've watched) I felt this could have been an actual week in the life of a DCI at New Scotland Yard. I liked all the characters presented and DCI Burt was a firm favourite, I liked how we had insight into his personal life and how he was firm and fair with his colleagues. I was shocked by the revelations (without giving spoilers) and I was probably as frustrated and shocked by the outcome at the end as DCI Burt probably was! The Voice for me was a fantastic crime thriller and one that I couldn't put down.

This was a fast paced and thrilling mystery crime novel written from multiple POV - the criminals and the police. I have always been a sucker for a really good police procedural novel and that’s just what this is.

Briefly, Burt is asked by a former colleague to find a missing army officer, his son, which he agrees to - unofficially. At the same time his team are working on two major cases. His investigations all seem to lead back to “The Voice” a criminal mastermind who uses voice distortion to disguise his identity.

This was a good read. Plenty of action, lots of thrills and some great twists and turns, and even though there are many threads to this book they all meet seamlessly by the end. Very enjoyable.

While he and his new team try to determine who is strangling single women, Burt gets assigned on an additional case that's to be kept under wraps at all cost.

We get introduced to some new characters, reacquainted with some old, and see some development in Burt's character, both as an inspector and in his personal life. Through an objective narration, the colour and quirks of the characters shine through, easily endearing them to the reader.

I was quickly vested in the solving of these two cases and kept guessing until the end as to how it would all work out. Reid reeled me in from the beginning so I couldn’t put this down until I finally arrived at the gratifying conclusion.

I definitely want more and look forward to seeing these terrific characters again and meeting new ones as they’re introduced. DCI Burt is my new Alex Delaware, and fans of Jonathan Kellerman and Harlan Coben will thoroughly enjoy this gripping, compelling stuff.

I have been waiting far too long for the next instalment in this wonderfully enthralling DCI Steve Burt series but has been well worth it!!! Consistently brilliant story telling as expected with interwoven plots full of suspense and ingenuity. With so many titles and brilliant authors in this genre we as readers are spoilt for choice but you must read not only this book but the whole series if you love crime fiction and police dramas full of murder, mystery and plot twists you will never expect.

The Revenge has all of the characteristics of the previous DCI Steve Burt series - well written, fast paced, intriguing cases and great police work from the team that continue to grow and evolve as characters with every case. And as with the rest of the books it still feels fresh and original with new crimes, conspiracies and killings.

If you have read any of the series before - read and enjoy If you have never read any of the series before - start here, you will not be disappointed

📕The Revenge by John Reid 📕

Although part of the DCI Burt series of murder mysteries, this can be read as a standalone. However, I have read some of the previous books & would suggest you do the same as they are fab.

Burt & his team are asked to help establish if an RAF pilot is guilty of betraying his country. Whilst working on this case, the Special Resolutions Team is given the additional task of discovering who murdered Colin Clark. Both stories run concurrently & move along at a brisk pace; Burt & his team having to balance the demands of MI5/MI6 with their normal policing activities to uncover the truth.

An easy writing style makes for an enjoyable read with unexpected twists that kept me engaged & wanting to know what happened next. A brilliant place to start this series if you haven’t come across DCI Burt & his team before. Highly recommended. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

John Reid is a very good author, as I said, it’s the second book I read from him and whenever I’m coming to the end, I immediately want more. Why? Both books leave me with immense adrenaline, the story has a good pace and there is not a single moment when we do not want to know what will happen to the main character. “Will he live? Is he going to solve the mystery? Who’s going die? Is the team safe? Is he going ending with her?”.⠀

⁣If you like a good mystery slash suspense story, then you really have to add this book to your reading list! I believe this series could be easily adapted to a TV series, and The Disciples came to prove it.

One thing John Reid does and does well is he constructs gripping, complex plots with multiple threads that he always ties together perfectly at the end. The Abduction is no exception.

DCI Steve Burt, head of the Special Resolutions team at New Scotland Yard, is facing uphill battles on at least two fronts. First, his new boss, Commander Daphne Bloom, who replaced Burt’s old mentor and friend, Alfie Brooks, wants to disband his independent team. Despite the unit’s enviable clearance rate that leads the MET, Special Resolutions don’t fit with Bloom’s organizational chart ideas. And then, Burt’s team draws a politically charged missing person case when Suzan Plough-Henderson, daughter of a High Court judge, goes missing.

The pressure ratchets up when Burt’s team uncovers evidence showing someone abducted the young woman and Bloom continues her unwarranted heavy handed administrative interference while Special Resolutions works to find and free the judge’s daughter. And if there isn’t enough on his plate already, Burt and his team determine that their past major case and some of the same players may bear heavily on their new one.

There’s a lot going on here as Burt and his team revisit a past murder, try to find Suzan Plough-Henderson before she suffers harm, and understand more about how the abductions ties into their most recent major case, made more difficult because of Commander Daphne Bloom’s meddling.

It all works here because it’s all part of the plot (and the same case) so it’s not distracting focusing on several investigative threads at once which miraculously fit together at the end. That’s quite an accomplishment, especially since Reid even adds to the mix a Jason Bourne-like character, a retired British soldier recruited by some secretive clandestine and off the books British intelligence agency to assassinate suspected enemies of the crown. Reid sets a fast pace from the beginning, and it doesn’t let up until the very end. And he offers some very clever twists along the way.

The Abduction is a page turner of the first order that will have readers saying bring on DCI Burt #8.

A brisk, entertaining, well-written and engaging police procedural, this series follows the caseload of New Scotland Yard DCI Steve Burt, Head of the Special Resolutions unit, where he leads a team (mostly assembled case-by-case) of crackerjack detectives and specialists tasked with resolving the serious crimes that no other department can solve.

In this particular instalment, DCI Burt has his hands full with not one, but two major crimes - one consisting of a series of murders, and the second a potential threat to UK National Security.

Adding in 20 tonnes of Bank of England gold bullion, the steamy world of MI6 and Turkish terrorism, and a hint of “Money Heist” on an equally grand scale, this story quickly becomes populated with so many twists and turns and shadowy figures “under watch” that it’s unclear for quite some time who the “bad guys” really are. Lords and Ladies, Right Honorables, country mansions, genteel penury, pampered wastrels, match-making antics (replete with fathers “desperate” to marry-off young and grasping daughters), tweed jackets, brandy and cigars, a world clearly tailor-made for literary murder emerges - as this not-so-modern-after-all Agatha Christie counterpart unravels a cleverly-convoluted set of mysteries for the reader to solve.

I enjoyed this read, a well-balanced mixture of police procedure and suspense that keeps the plot moving quickly, finding DCI Steve Burt a likable and level-headed leader, who manages to rattle his commanding officers, while generating the respect of his team (a team, which, somewhat uniquely among books of this genre, shrinks and grow with some rapidity, keeping the cast of secondary characters unusually fluid).

This book follows DCI Steve Burt who is the lead of the Special Resolutions Unit at New Scotland Yard. An ex-colleague brings a missing persons case to his attention that the police have dismissed, but soon they believe there is more to this case than just a missing person. DCI Steve Burt starts to investigate going against orders from higher up. Meanwhile, a high-profile couple are murdered, and DCI Steve Burt is ordered to make this case his priority. With both cases developing at the same time, DCI Steve Burt tries to solve both cases at the same time. Is there more to this case than a missing person? How will the team manage both investigations at the same time? I enjoyed reading this crime mystery, as the main character DCI Steve Burt really cares about solving the cases and about his team. He also isn’t afraid to go against orders and to do things his own way. It was great to read the interactions between the colleagues and the people also brought in to help with the investigations. It showed a great lot of teamwork, and how respected DCI Steve Burt is to his colleagues. I would love to read more of DCI Steve Burt’s mysteries in the future. Overall, a gripping crime mystery where DCI Steve Burt is up against it to solve two very important cases.

I loved the first one of this series, and whilst I knew the old "gang" wouldn't be back together, I was excited to see what Steve would be getting up to next. It picks up a few months after book one but the gaps are filled nicely and you jump straight in. There's two main cases to solve in this one, and I was definitely more intrigued by one more than the other. The new team don't disappoint, and support Steve brilliantly through the book. I definitely felt part of the detective team as I joined their journey and it’s great to see it all unravel.

The case is solved by a team of “misfits” who were on the way out of the job which just goes to show never judge a book by its cover! A great opener to the DCI Steve Burt series that definitely leaves you wanting more. This is the first book in a series of crime novels with this protagonist. For a first instalment, I found it to be very interesting, with a good and fast plot and a special idea. I look forward to the next adventures of the team.

It begins with a simple murder but quickly becomes a fascinating mixture of murder investigations, international crime syndicates, and political corruption in high places. John Reid offers here one of the most expansive, intricate, and imaginative crime fiction plots I’ve read in a long while and I’m only sorry I didn’t get to this novel sooner. It’s a cracking good read, especially for those of us who enjoy reading proper British crime mysteries and thrillers.

DCI Steve Burt runs Special Resolutions, an elite unit in the Metropolitan Police Force that specializes in investigating serious crime cases other units either can’t or don’t want to handle. The Special Resolutions Unit is something of a dumping ground for the Met’s most troublesome cases. Just when his commander hands Burt and his team an unsolved headless body murder case with few leads, someone murders DC Elsie Brown, a female detective in Norwich on the verge of retirement. When the Norwich police can’t make any headway on the case, Burt and the Special Resolutions Unit get handed that case too. Complicating things is Burt’s commander has put his name forward for a promotion to the Chief Superintendent’s job and head of CID at the Norwich Constabulary. So, besides taking on some difficult murder cases, Burt faces deciding about accepting the promotion, which entails moving himself and his family from London to Norwich. And his wife Alison, who has a thriving medical practice in London, isn’t immediately keen on the idea of moving.

While his team works on the headless body case in London, Burt and one of his top investigators, Matt Conway, head to Norwich to investigate Brown’s murder. They hardly get started on the case before another murder happens, this time a retired Norwich supervising detective Elsie Brown once worked for. Burt and Conway begin to suspect the murders are related and have something to do with a seven-year-old murder case that had long gone cold but that Elsie Brown had kept working on, unable to let it go.

The story moves back and forth between Burt’s murder investigations and the fortunes of two notorious London drug dealers, the brothers Andrew and David Black. They are forging an agreement with an Amsterdam-based drug kingpin that promises to propel the Black brothers to the top of the criminal heap in London drug and prostitution scene. As the story continues, an intersection develops between the illicit activities of the Black brothers and the murders that But and his Special Resolutions squad are investigating. The investigations become more and more complex and what began as two straightforward murder investigations grow more heads than Medusa.

I really like the Steve Burt character, a hard charging and logical thinking police investigator with excellent deductive skills who expertly guides his team towards solutions to some ever more complicated investigations. Burt’s family background and his struggle to decide whether to accept the offered promotion that Reid seasons the story with help develop Burt into a compelling, realistic, and multi-faceted character. But beyond DCI Burt, Reid gives us a host of other interesting, believable, and sometimes flamboyant characters. Two of my other favourite characters were Inspector Terry Harvey, an eccentric technical expert that often aids the efforts of Burt’s team and Burt’s admin assistant, Amelia “Poppy” Cooper, who is a competent police office but with a flair for dressing provocatively.

On balance, The Norwich Murders is a cracking good read sure to be enjoyed by fans of proper British crime mysteries and thrillers. Reid does fine work ratcheting the suspense as the story advances toward the satisfying conclusion, making it difficult to put the book down because you can’t wait to learn what happens next. I look forward to reading more of DCI Burt’s future adventures and catching up with some of those that came before this sixth book in the series.