This is the 3rd book in The Forgotten Files series by the Author and can in my opinion be read as a standalone

Cop , Julia Vargas , is still on a mission to solve the case of the Hangman serial killer ..... the same case her
father was working on when he 'supposedly' killed himself .... her quest for the truth is always there in the back of
her mind .
When a woman's body is found downtown with a photograph of a young Julia and Jim the past soon comes rushing to the fore . Working with homicide Detective Tobias Novak can she put their past aside to concentrate on the case which just might resolve the past ....... or does the killer now have Julia in his sights ?

This is an enjoyable fast paced thriller full of twists and turns that will keep the reader fully engrossed in the outcome .

Great book. I received an ARC for an honest review and I can honestly say I loved it. The suspense made it a page turner and the interaction between Novak and Julia was lovely. Novak was everything I would want in a H, strong, protective, sexy and Julia was a great h, strong-willed, a little stubborn, afraid of intimacy and vulnerable. I highly recommend Hangman and look forward to more in the series.

Thank you to Netgalley,, the publisher and the author for the opportunity to read this book in return for my honest opinion.

I haven't read a Mary Burton book I didn't like and this book was no exception. It is the third in the Forgotten Files series but is easily a stand alone book. I was on the edge of my seat as Julia tried to solve this cold case, an old case of her father's, that seems to be getting to close to home. Many times I was sure I knew who the killer was only to be foiled every time. Great book and great ending. Really enjoyed the main characters in this book and will definitely be reading more of Mary Burton's books.

RATING: 4 STARS
(I received an ARC from the PUBLISHER via NETGALLEY)
(Review Not on Blog)

Another gritty suspenseful novel in the Forgotten Files series. In this one we have Julia, a cop, who has been trying to figure out the Hangman case as it took her father. Supposedly, he killed himself while trying to solve the crime. Now thirty years later, the Hangman is back and Julia, along with homicide detective Novak, are the trail.

I hope that this series does not stop with this third book. I am enjoying the characters and cases of Forgotten Files. This was an another quick absorbing story!

The Hangman is amazing! It kept me at the edge of my seat the entire time! Mary Burton's Forgotten Files series is fantastic and I can hardly wait to see where she goes with this series next!

WOW, OH WOW!!!! AMAZING! The Hangman will keep you guessing all the way until the end, then BAM, You find out who it is. (Never even guessed) Seriously suspenseful, very addictive with romance. You will NOT regret reading this story.
This is the 3rd in the Forgotten Files series. You can read The Hangman as a stand alone, but you'll want to read the others once you finish this one.
Julia Vargus is a Virginia State Trooper. She was undercover for a while, took down a bad drug dealer. Julia gets put on leave for a while, when on leave she reopens the Hangman case (from 25 years ago). Her father was Jim Vargus. Jim was investigating the case, (25 years ago) he commits suicide, there was lots of talk about Jim being The Hangman. Now 25 years later The Hangmans back, and Jim's dead. The case is in detective Novaks jurisdiction. He and Julia decide to work this case together. This is one of those stories that once you start reading, you won't want to stop until it's finished. Enjoy! :)

Julia Vargas is a cop who is following in the footsteps of her father, Jim. Jim was working on the Hangman case when he committed suicide. Julia was just a young child at the time but grew up to become a cop herself and is trying 25 years later to solve the Hangman case her father was unable to solve. An old body is found in a deserted house dating to the Hangman murders 25 years ago. As Julia investigates this recently discovered murder along with the unsolved Hangman murders, a new, current murder occurs that is very similar to those that occurred so long ago. Julia eventually becomes the target of the Hangman.

This is my first book by Mary Burton, and I mostly enjoyed it. I really like this type of mystery, but I could have forever done without the descriptive sex scenes. They really have no place in the serial killer mystery and actually detract from it. I am interested in reading more by Mary Burton, but I hope there are no graphic sexual interludes like those in this book. I will try another book by this author, but if the sex is as prominent, I believe I will avoid her novels in the future. I have subtracted one star in my rating due to the descriptive sex episodes.



The case once again hits dangerously close, however, when a woman’s bones are discovered in a historic downtown home, together with a photograph of Jim and Julia as a young girl. As horrifying as this discovery is, it may just be the break Julia has waited for. Working alongside Tobias Novak, a homicide detective with whom she shares a complicated—and steamy—history, she’s forced to confront her own past even as the Hangman looms in the shadows. But as the mysterious killer circles closer, Julia can feel her own noose begin to tighten…

It was another enjoyable book from Ms. Burton, however I thought it should have been a short story, I figured out fairly quickly who the villain was, and that a lot of the writing was just unnecessary filler, but then you may disagree and enjoy more, so pick it up and read my friends, because it still will pass the time. Enjoy!

This is the third book in The Forgotten Files Series and this series is just fantastic. I have loved every book so far. This one just kept me turning the pages. It is not for the faint of heart. I really love this author. She keeps us guessing with twists and turns, along with fast-moving character involvement. I love the way each character has the potential to be involved in the murders and I loved that I was still guessing as the story ended. I loved the suspense and it took off straight from the beginning till the end. I will be reading more books by this author.

I like when a cold case and a current crime have elements that point to the same perpetrator and that's what Ms. Burton has done in The Hangman. After a undercover assignment that ended bad, Julia Vargas has decided to pull the cold case that was the last case her father had worked on prior to his death. A case which supposedly drove her dad to commit suicide. Not only does she want to solve this case, but she wants to know if her dad was murdered or committed suicide. I really enjoyed the plot.

Complications arise on a personal level as she works side by side with a man who she has a steamy relationship with and at the same time she is trying to keep the intimacy out of the relationship. But Novak wasn’t accepting the no intimacy offer and wants more. Although patient, he also pushes for more. I felt both characters were believable and I liked their back stories.

This was definitely a really good read!

The Hangman is the third book in The Forgotten Series by Mary Burton and can be read as a stand-alone.

Julia Vargas is re-investigating The Hangman case her father was working on before committing suicide. Meanwhile Tobias Novak, a homicide detective, is investigating a crime scene in a burnt building where a woman’s body is discovered. Next to the body is a picture of Julia with her dad when she was a little girl. Julia has no idea how the picture ended at the scene of crime and how the victim was connected to her dad. Is this a copycat killer or is the old Hangman back ? When more victims connected to Julia start turning up it is a race against time.

This is a good mystery novel and I loved the characters especially Julia , who is a strong independent woman. The romance between Julia and Novak was a nice distraction and the back story of the characters were interesting. Overall a good read!

Many thanks to the publisher & NetGalley for this sample copy in exchange for my honest and fair review.

This and more reviews at https://chloesbooksblog.wordpress.com/

I have been reading Mary Burton's books for a few years now and always look for new titles of hers. This one is another excellent read.

Thanks for the chance to read this

This was a great read. Mary Burton is a wonderful writer who gets your attention from page 1. I was surprised on the outcome of the story, it wasn't what I was expecting. Julia had to deal with the present but also with the past and how it involved her father. Would recommend anyone who likes a suspenseful book.

This was the third book in the Forgotten files. I haven't read the other two books but don't think I've missed any references to the previous books. In this book Julia investigates the crimes of the Hangman while.defending her father's reputation. Great read!!

The Hangman (The Forgotten Files #3) by Mary Burton is the best suspense thriller (with romantic overtones) this genre has to offer. Those who enjoy police procedurals will be hooked from beginning to end as the main couple try to find a deranged serial killer who has killed women by hanging over two decades. Julia, the heroine is well known within the police community, not just because she’s in law enforcement, but her father was also. He was an undercover cop who killed himself. There were rumors he might be The Hangman killer. Julia doesn’t believe her father was this serial killer. But then when a new body of a woman is found in an abandoned factory from twenty years ago, it’s believed to be the work of The Hangman.

Julia is brought into the case by Jim, the man she is currently sleeping with. These two are lovers, but they keep it quiet because of their professional relationship. As she and Jim go back in time to learn more about The Hangman’s victims- all women, and most prostitutes, she learns some secrets about her father that turns her world upside down. She and Jim fall down a rabbit hole that leads them to many twists and turns, and even more unanswered questions. But someone, perhaps more than one, wants to stop Julia before she figures out who The Hangman is, and if her father was involved with him, or is indeed this killer.

The Hangman has so many shocks, and a few awes. You will be on the edge of your seat as Julia and Jim try to solved a decades’ old mystery, as well as clearing her father’s name. This is one twisted book, not just because of the gruesome way The Hangman kills his victims, but the killer’s reasons for why they do, or did the things that may have caused Julia’s father to shoot himself in the head. Or did he? So many questions until the bitter end.

The Hangman is truly a top notch thriller that will have you riveted until the last page. A must read!

The Hangman is the third book in Mary Burton’s The Forgotten Files and just like the other two, this one does not disappoint. The suspense is intense and all of tension that builds could be cut with a knife. The death toll spans back 25 years and involves an unlikely cast of characters that include a police officer who took his own life, a ruthless drug lord or two, and some not so innocent women.

The discovery of a woman’s decaying body in a burning house uncovers several interesting truths. One of those truths indicate that she may have been the last victim of a serial killer. The other truth shows that this woman had some sort of relationship with a cop who also died around the same time. Oddly enough, that cop’s daughter, Julia Vargas is now part of the Virginia State Police and is about to re-open the last case that her father Jim was working on before he died. The case is about a killer that was dubbed The Hangman. Some people even think that Jim Vargas may have been The Hangman. Julia is a great cop but she is emotionally unavailable due to a rough childhood and some baggage from her last undercover gig. She ends up getting some help with her investigation from a Richmond Detective named Tobias Novak. The two have been having a mostly sexual relationship so things get complicated as they work together on this case. Novak wants to help calm Vargas’ demons but she feels too damaged to open up. Their relationship creates an interesting distraction to the case.

There is so much to be said about how this all plays out but I can’t. Let’s just say that The Hangman was great. It was intriguing, emotional and surprising. I couldn’t stop trying to connect the dots as the mystery began to unravel. I had no idea who The Hangman was until he was revealed. The list of suspects was long and no one was above reproach. Mary Burton kept me guessing and I pointed the finger to the wrong person every time. That’s what I love about this series. Nothing is what it seems. In addition, I couldn’t help but hope that Novak and Vargas became a real couple as they were very good for each other. Plus, several people from the previous books make an appearance since this all happens to involve the same police departments. I look forward to the next discovery.

Reviews by the Wicked Reads Review Team

Avid Reader – ☆☆☆☆☆
4.5 stars
M/F Mystery
Triggers: Murder, suicide

I have loved each and every book in this series and this one didn't disappoint. Julia is trying to figure out why her father committed suicide when she was so young. It's been something that has bothered her throughout her career – people always assuming the worst, worrying that she'll end up doing the same thing, she just wants to know once and for all, was he the killer people think he might have been?

Then you have a series of murders that appear very similar to the hangman cases from back when her father and his partner, Ken, were working on them. Ken is suffering from early Alzheimer's, but when he's having a good day, he is able to answer questions and shoot the breeze with fellow officers. As the case runs deeper, he is more easily agitated and Julia has to tread more carefully.

Novak is an agent who wants nothing more than to help Julia get to the bottom of her case, because in doing that, it means that hopefully, he'll have more answers for his own case. Is the Hangman killer back?

Throughout the story, there are a lot of things that unfold. You have the mystery of who is killing these women, who killed them back then, why was Julia's family so broken, and who is hoping to target her now?

There are some points of the book that seem to drag a little, but overall, this is a mystery that is worth the read. I really like how Julia is able to stand on her own – she wants the truth no matter what. Novak is there to protect and support Julia, and with others wanting the truth just as much, the cold case is reopened and ultimately solved.


Sarah – ☆☆☆☆☆
This story kept me guessing right up to the very end. The third book in this series focuses on State Trooper Julia and Homicide detective Tobias. Together they investigate links between recent murders and a series of murders investigated by Julia’s father twenty years ago.

Mary Burton is quickly becoming a favourite crime writer. As always, the plot strands in this story are intricately and cleverly pieced together. I love the way each character has the potential to be involved in the murders and I loved that I was still guessing as the story ended. I love the suspense as the killer draws closer to Julia. I was unable to put this down until I knew whodunnit – so this ended up as a single sitting read.

The relationship between Julia and Tobias is complicated and heavy with baggage. I’m not sure I’d call it a romance, but I enjoyed the trust and care that builds unexpectedly between them. Familiar characters are back in this story and I enjoyed watching favourite characters work together on a new case.

I find it difficult to review crime stories without giving too much away. This is a fantastic murder mystery and after reading the first three books in this series, I have become a huge fan of this author. I would encourage any readers who love well written crime stories to start at the beginning of this exciting series.


Veronica – ☆☆☆☆
I was scheduled to start reading The Hangman the day that a book I'd been wait a year for released. I thought that was no way The Hangman would be able to hold my attention with the other book begging for me to read it. But I need not have worried. All it took was the prologue and I was hooked.

Agent Julia Vargas starts investigating The Hangman case. Her father had worked on the same case 25 years prior, but when he committed suicide, the murders stopped and it was always suspected that Julia's father was The Hangman.

Julia's lover, Detective Tobais Novak, is called out his lover's bed in the middle of the night to investigate a homicide. It turns out the victim has been dead 25 years and may be connected to The Hangman and is definitely connected to Julia's father.

There are a lot of clues to follow in this story and unravelling mystery of who the killer is and how the three victims are connected goes right down to the wire. It is riveting reading. The relationship between Tobias and Julia added a lovely drop of romance to the story too.

The Hangman is well worth reading.

This book was pure Mary Burton; she gave us a suspenseful thriller that kept you guessing from one page to the next mixed in with a little bit of romance. The book was a buildup of what happened 25 years ago when serial killer known as the Hangman had killed three women. Julia’s police officer/undercover officer dad had worked on this case and was thought to have committed suicide but there was always the lingering question if her father could have possibly been the Hangman. Now Julia was going to find out one way or another if this was fact or fiction no matter what the outcome was. Detective Novak was called to a home where bones were discovered and knew this had a good chance of tying in with Julia’s case. Detective Novak was having a little thing with Julia so contacting her and working on this case was only going to have them spending more time together.

As I said before the ups and downs and the twists and turns this story had was pure enjoyment and had me feeling as if I was working on the Hangman case right along with Julia and Novak. Another great suspense thriller by Ms. Burton and I always look forward to what she has coming next.

This book was provided as an ARC from NetGalley for an honest review.

The Hangman is the third title in Mary Burton’s Forgotten Files series of romantic suspense novels, in which the protagonists find themselves investigating ‘cold cases’, unsolved crimes dating back many years, which hold a particular significance for them. The principals in each story are different, so although some characters from the previous books appear in secondary roles, there’s no need to have read them to enjoy this one, which works perfectly well as a standalone. I have yet to read the first book, The Shark, but I thoroughly enjoyed book two, The Dollmaker, and was very impressed with the author’s ability to weave together a number of seemingly unrelated plot-threads and then to bring them together into a cleverly devised, complex whole.

We met Agent Julia Vargas of the Virginia State Police briefly in that book, and it was immediately clear that she’s one tough cookie. Her dad, Jim Vargas, was also a cop, and was a somewhat controversial figure; his undercover work brought down a number of dangerous criminals over the years, but the need to constantly be someone else took its toll on his personal life, and he committed suicide twenty-five years earlier, when Julia was just a child. Julia followed in his footsteps, becoming a cop, working undercover to bust criminal gangs and drug rings, but her most recent assignment went pear-shaped towards the end, and she suffered a vicious assault at the hands of the leader of the drug cartel she had infiltrated. Following a lengthy convalescence, Julia now works homicide alongside her partner, Dakota Sharp (hero of The Dollmaker), and has decided, during her vacation, to re-open her father’s last, unsolved case, that of the Hangman, who murdered two women back in the early 1990s, the moniker relating to the way the murders were committed and the bodies left hanging as though on display for all to see. In fact, there were those who actually suspected Jim Vargas of being the Hangman because the victims were known to him – and Julia wants to see if she can find anything in the old files that will help her to completely clear her father’s name. Or prove his guilt. She just wants the truth.

Detective Tobias Novak of the Richmond police isn’t overly happy about being dragged from the warmth of his bed –and the woman in it – to attend the scene of a fire in an old, downtown home. The body of a young woman has been found in the basement; the degree of decomposition indicates that it has been there for quite some time and the marks and injuries on what is left of the corpse indicate that this was death by homicide. Looking through the victim’s personal effects at the scene Novak is shocked to discover a photograph of Jim Vargas and his daughter (aged seven, he discovers later) in the woman’s purse. He puts in a call to Julia Vargas – the woman with whom he’d been in that warm bed – to ask her to come to the crime scene, and when she arrives, shows her the photo. Julia has absolutely no knowledge of how it could have got there, and doesn’t know the dead woman, but the discovery of her body, bearing all the hallmarks of The Hangman’s unique style, could be just the thing to kick-start her own investigations into the other unsolved killings and her father’s suicide.

Julia enlists the help of Shield Security, the high-tech security firm who had assisted Dakota Sharp in his investigations into the Dollmaker killings and part of whose remit is to assist law enforcement officers dig into cold cases using technology not previously available to uncover new evidence and unearth new leads. But when another young woman is murdered – seemingly by the Hangman – the stakes are raised. Is this the work of a copycat, or has the Hangman come out of retirement? And upping the ante still more is the fact that Julia knew the victim from her last undercover operation. The Hangman is sending Julia a message loud and clear – and she and Novak know it’s only a matter of time before the killer tries to make good on his threat.

The mystery is cleverly plotted and skilfully delivered as Julia gradually pieces together a picture of the father she had never really known while at the same time discovering the truth of his connections to the decades-ago victims of the Hangman’s crimes. Like her dad, Julia is very self-sufficient and careful not to let anyone get too close, keeping her emotions under wraps and details about herself and her life close to her chest. Her relationship with Novak began only recently when they hooked up after an event, and she’s keen to keep things between them strictly no-strings while it’s clear that he wants more. I enjoyed watching their relationship progress, with Novak’s calm steadiness acting as the perfect foil to Julia’s more impulsive temperament, and eventually providing her with the safe place she needs to finally be able to drop her guard and let him in.

Novak and Julia are together throughout pretty much the entire book, and although the romance is fairly low-key, there’s an ever-present sense of attraction and awareness between them throughout. The ending is nicely done and we leave the pair with an HFN that I fully expect to have turned into a longer term HEA by the time of the next book, which I’m hoping will feature Shield Security’s Garrett Andrews.

The Hangman is a well-paced mystery that kept me eagerly turning the pages into the early hours to see what would happen next. Ms. Burton’s meticulous plotting provides plenty of twists and turns, and her central characters are engaging and nicely-matched. Highly recommended for fans of the author’s and for anyone who likes a complex, solidly written mystery with a dash of romance.

Grade B+