ARC REVIEW: Fall – by Tracy Clark

Title: Fall
(Detective Harriet Foster #2)
Author: Tracy Clark
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Detective
First published: December 5th 2023
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Finished reading: November 28th 2023
Pages: 345

“Guilt and blame were useless things, but that didn’t stop either from eating a person alive.”

*** A copy of this book was kindly provided to me by Netgalley and Thomas & Mercer in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! ***

REVIEW

I read the first book of this series earlier this year and I really enjoyed my first introduction with Harriet Foster and the rest of the team. It’s easy to understand why I couldn’t resist adding this sequel to my TBR when it appeared on my radar… I’ve been looking forward to pick up Fall, and it turned out to be a solid enough sequel. Not as good as the first one for me, but then again a serial killer angle always wins it over politics and corruption for me… Fall is by no means a bad detective thriller though.

Technically you can read Fall as a stand-alone, although I wouldn’t advice it as you will be missing out on substantial character background of the main character as well as her dynamics with the rest of the team. This sequel did seem to have a different feel than the first book, and the pace was considerably slower than expected in certain parts. I guess this was part of the reason why it took me longer than expected to read this story… The fact that I guessed who was behind it all very early on didn’t really help either.

The plot itself focuses a lot on politics and corruption, which is never my favorite angle. Add the fact that there is a whole lot of cheating going on by multiple characters, and there was plenty motive for me to grow my dislike for this sequel. I can’t deny that I was intrigued by the whole case though, and I kept hoping that I was wrong about the killer and that there was going to be a big twist at some point. Did I guess the full truth behind their motive? Not exactly. But I did feel like the identity was too poorly disguised to help add proper suspense to the plot.

As for the characters… Once again, I liked Vera Li so much better than our actual main character and partner Harriet Foster. She is growing on me a little, but there is just something very cliche about her and some of her actions can get really frustrating. That whole mess with her former partner also distracted considerably from the main case, and I kind of wish it wouldn’t have been there. I did like the banter between the detectives working on the case, and I enjoyed following them around as they try to solve the puzzle.

All in all I can’t deny that I preferred the first book, but Fall was still worth the read for me. I will probably still read the next book as well to see how the whole personal situation will unfold… Although part of me hopes the main focus will be on a new murder investigation instead.