‘No Secrets’ by David Jackson | @Author_Dave @ViperBooks | #20BooksOfSummer

Author : David Jackson
Title : No Secrets
Pages : 320
Publisher : Viper Books
Publication date : July 7, 2022

| ABOUT THE BOOK |

THEY ALL BELIEVE HIM. THEY BELIEVE HIS LIES. SHE KNOWS THE TRUTH.

You can’t lie to Izzy Lambert. Her highly developed empathic abilities allow her to read people’s emotions with terrifying accuracy – and consequences. As a child her insights sparked her parents’ divorce. As an adult she avoids getting too close to people for fear of what she might learn.

But now young girls are going missing in her town. The police have no suspects but, seeing her old school caretaker interviewed on the news about the story, Izzy comes to a chilling realisation: he knows where the missing girls are. When the police won’t take her seriously despite the lives at stake, she will risk everything to uncover the truth. 

| MY THOUGHTS |

Izzy Lambert has something a little like a superpower. Her highly empathic abilities allow her to read people’s emotions. And lies. So when the caretaker of her former school appears on tv as a potential witness to the abduction of a young girl, Izzy knows instantly that he is not telling the truth. Bringing this information to the police is about as useful as banging her head against a brick wall. Nobody believes her. Only one thing remains for Izzy to do. Uncover the truth by herself. But that way lies danger.

To be honest, David Jackson’s books and I haven’t really been getting along that well lately. I was a massive fan of the DS Nathan Cody series but for some reason, Jackson’s stand-alones have been leaving me rather underwhelmed so far. (Sorry, David!) But I’m stubborn and I keep reading his books because I’m hopeful that our author/reader relationship will be restored. Also, come on, who could possibly resist that intriguing blurb?

The main protagonist, Izzy, is a fabulous character. Instantly likeable, she managed to get me completely on her side from the very beginning. Also because, she’s living the dream by working in a bookshop, surrounded by lovely books all day long. I may have been somewhat jealous. Just like I was jealous of her ability to know when someone is telling a lie. At first that sounded infinitely cool until you’re faced with the consequences of, for instance, breaking up your parents’ marriage. Suddenly it’s decidedly less cool and you’re left to wonder : if you *do* know someone is lying, should you always let that fact be known? I do so love it when a story makes me think things through like this.

Izzy’s pursuit of Kenneth, the caretaker, becomes more tense as the story goes on. The reader is also offered an insight into Kenneth’s life. To say it’s a mess seems to be quite the understatement and yet, like the horrible person I am, I found it pretty hard to care about him. Although I suspect I wasn’t really supposed to. Maybe. In any case, as much as Izzy is immensely likeable, Kenneth is most definitely not. Another likeable character comes in the shape of DS Frendy who, for reasons of his own, wants to help Izzy even if it lands him in trouble with his bosses.

I thoroughly enjoyed “No Secrets” but I did have a few niggles. Let me just say this is quite possibly just me being extremely nit-picky because I seem to be turning into somewhat of a curmudgeonly old bat lately. There are moments where a character or two acted so incredibly stupidly that my eyes nearly rolled out of my head. Here comes the vagueness : there is something a certain character does, involving an animal, which I already hated, but that in hindsight also felt completely out of character for that particular character. I’m not sure I used the word “character” enough here. And then there’s the conclusion of the story, which I’m not entirely sure made sense and made me feel as if I should re-read the book.

That said! Did I mention I enjoyed it? Helped by the refreshing premise, I found ‘No Secrets‘ highly entertaining, full of suspense and immensely addictive. This is definitely a binge-read story so make sure you carve out enough time to finish it in one sitting. I’m pleased to say this particular author/reader relationship has been restored and this time I’m definitely not underwhelmed. I’m very much looking forward to David Jackson’s next offering!

No Secrets it out today! My thanks to the publisher for the review copy, which I received via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

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20 Books of Summer : 6/20