Publication: 8th June 2023 (eBook), 31st August 2023 (paperback) – One More Chapter
A Siren’s call… to murder
Former Met police officer Jodie ‘Nosey’ Parker is working a trial period as an auxiliary Detective Sergeant with the Penstowan police force. But living and working alongside DCI Nathan Withers – while still trying to grow her catering company – brings its own challenges, especially when Jodie’s attention is quickly taken up by the suspicious drowning of a local fisherman.
While tourists and locals alike are falling under the spell of the annual mermaid festival with its captivating legends of Sirens luring fishermen to their deaths, Jodie and Nathan fear they may have found themselves in the middle of a very real – and very dangerous – turf war. As the casualties start to stack up, they must face the likelihood that something sinister has been going on under their noses for some time…
Jodie Parker had promised her daughter and her mother that once she left the Met she was done with serious and dangerous policing working. However, working as an auxiliary DS with the Penstowan police means that she’s been called to help her boyfriend, DCI Nathan Withers, on a few cases, while also growing her own catering service. When, dressed as a mermaid for the annual local festival, she stumbles upon a body, she has no choice but to get involved in the investigation. The murdered man is a local fisherman who seemed to be involved in something suspicious and possibly illegal. When another local is found unconscious and tortured it is clear that the two cases are linked and Jodie and Nathan need to find out the truth before someone else gets hurt.
Jodie Parker is an interesting and well-developed character. She is trying to juggle two jobs, and trying not to disappoint her teenage daughter, her widowed mother, and her charming boyfriend. For twenty years she worked in the London Metropolitan Police, which she left to return to her place of birth, promising her daughter and mother that she was done with that life. However, that is easier said than done, especially when she is really good at her job (except for the boring paperwork side of the job) and she keeps finding herself involved in investigations.
The case she is now working is surrounded by the local legend of the mermaid which adds a spooky atmosphere to the event. The reality, however, is much more complex, practical, and full of twists.
A Cornish Seaside Murder is the sixth book in the Nosey Parker series, but it’s the first one I read so I can’t honestly tell you that it can be easily read as a stand-alone. It is entertaining, suspenseful, and engrossing, and I enjoyed it so much that I plan to read the other books in the series.
A huge thank you to One More Chapter and NetGalley for providing me with a proof of the novel.
Fiona Leitch is a novelist and screenwriter with a chequered past. She’s written for footballing and motoring magazines, childbirth videos and mail order catalogues; DJ’ed at illegal raves in London, been told off by a children’s TV presenter during a studio debate; and was the Australasian face of a series of TV commercials for a cleaning product. All of which has given her a thorough grounding in the ridiculous, and helped her to write funny stuff.
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