Sucked right in from opening. It’s a bit like a recipie with a list of ingredients for what appears to be separate dishes but will at the end all come together to make one perfectly cooked and presented dinner. Having said that some of the situations and descriptions in the book could put you off your food! Not gratuatis but I don’t think it will do much for the Lakes tourst board. A great book that stayed with me while I was waiting for the chance to read more. Excellent read! My teeth were clenched in tension towards the end. An honest review of an ARC.

This is the first in the DI Kelly Porter series and it's got off to a great start.

When I read the synopsis I thought it sounded great and I wasn't disappointed, as soon as I started reading it I was hooked. It's the sort of book you just can't put down and I read it in a day.

Kelly has returned home to the Lake District after years working for the Met in London and is now working for the Cumbria Constabulary. Her first case is a cold one, concerning 10 year old Lottie Davies, who vanished while out with her parents and her body is found weeks later. At the same time she is working on two other cases regarding an illegal immigrant and the death of a businessman. What Kelly uncovers during these cases is a lot more sinister than she first thought and she risks a lot while trying to help others.

This book is gritty and hard hitting in some areas and is definitely not for the faint hearted reader. I personally loved the book and am already looking forward to book two. Thank you to Canelo for the auto approval, I will post my review on Goodreads now and on Amazon on publication day.

What a great start to a new series that I know I will be following.

The blurb for this book says it all:
“Kelly begins work on a cold case that shocked the local community – the abduction and brutal murder of ten-year-old Lottie Davies.
Meanwhile, Kelly is also investigating two seemingly straightforward crimes: a case involving an illegal immigrant, and a robbery following the death of local businessman Colin Day. But evidence comes to light that reveals a web of criminal activity beyond anything Kelly imagined. Behind the veneer of sleepy, touristy towns lies a dark and dangerous underworld. As Kelly threatens to expose those with much to lose, she risks paying the ultimate price to get to the truth…”

This book is gritty and is quite graphic in places especially when the people who no longer serve their purpose are ‘got rid of.’

Kelly is a likeable character and her relationship with her mother and sister is one that will sound familiar to a lot of people. She’s moved back to the Lakes for a quieter life but the cases she works on grow more and more complex and become very dangerous.

This is a brilliant book and I highly recommend it.
Thanks to NetGalley and Canelo for giving me the opportunity to read it.

For me this book was too full of information.

We meet Kelly and then get pages and pages of her moving back to her mums house in to her old room.

It is nice to have a bit of description but we do not have to have it all in one go.


Sometimes it's nice to have some more detail later in the book not thrown at you in one fell swoop.

It felt like the author thinks we have already met the characters and their seems to be some details about Kelly that are missing.

I was getting bored and kept skipping pages because just too much description.

I did not finish the book it slowly begun to annoy me and did not continue to read it sorry.

A fantastic introduction to a crime series, I was hooked from the very beginning and the story held my interest throughout.
This is a good old fashioned detective novel, dark, gritty and thoroughly intriguing. We meet Kelly, the main character who has transferred back to her home town and is living with her mother. She is investigating a cold case murder case and two other investigations. Kelly is a hardworking detective determined to get to the bottom of these cases but also fighting some personal battles.
These kind of crime novels are my favourite and this one did not disappoint, I eagerly await the next instalment.

A great start to this new crime thriller, I love the main character DI Kelly Porter, she is certainly one gutsy lady. If she thought that returning to her home patch in the Lake District was going to mean a quiet life she was very much mistaken. She soon realises that she will have to deal with some very nasty pieces of work who will stop at nothing to gain power and money, stepping on and using whoever gets in their way. This book was very nearly a five star but for me it flagged a little bit half way through and then picked up again.

Dark Game by Kelly Lynch was my third book of 2018, and I consumed it pretty quickly as it was so easy to read. The main character DI Kelly Lynch was immediately likeable and believable, and I am sure there is more to come out about her past as this series evolves.
Kelly Lynch has moved back home to the Lake District after a number of years in the Met. Now back home living with her mum and nearby to the sister who she has not a thing in common with.
She arrives and starts to dig into a cold case of the death of a young girl. A local businessman is then found dead in one of his own hotels and this lifts the lid on a whole dark scene going on in the Lakes.
The pace of this book is great and keeps you turning the pages (or in my case touching the screen of my kindle). My only niggle I had was the referral to some of the Polish characters being referred to as illegal immigrants, as it’s not quite accurate but only a minor thing.
Thoroughly enjoyed this and I will be looking out for the next Kelly Porter book as I think this will be a good series.
I got given this as an advance copy by Net Galley and Canelo in exchange for a honest review. I gave this 5/5.

I enjoyed this book immensely. It was refreshing to have a story set in a rural setting like the Lake District, rather than an inner city. I liked Kelly, the main character, and her relationship with her family was an interesting contrast to her professional life, without being overplayed and detrimental to the main story line. This was a thoroughly engrossing read and I highly recommend it.

Dark Game

by Rachel Lynch

Canelo

General Fiction (Adult) , Mystery & Thrillers

Pub Date 29 Jan 2018

I am reviewing a copy of Dark Game through Canelo and Netgalley:

A scandal forces DI Kelly Porter out of the met so she turns home to her families home in the Lake District. Crimes in this area seem to be minor but Kelly begins working on a Cold Case that had shocked her local community, ten year old Lottie David was abducted and brutally murdered.

Kelly is also Investigating to current and seemingly straightforward cases. an illegal immigrant as well as a robbery that followed the death of a local businessman Collin Day. But things are far from straightforward and Kelly discovers criminal activity beyond anything she could have imagined. Secrets lie inside this sleepy tourist town, a Dark underworld, which is a hot bed of criminal activity. A discovery that could put Kelly’s life in Jeopardy.

Will Kelly be able to survive and help to stop these crimes?

Find out in Dark Game!

Four out of five stars!

Happy Reading

Took a little while to get into the book, whilst some parts seemed to drag other parts were rushed when more detail could have been added. It was almost as if parts of the book had been totally cut out explaining exactly why a character behaved the wAy they did. The plot was good and the characters were believable. There was an abundance of names thrown at you during the story which got a little confusing at times.
The last third of the book moved along at a fast pace and took next to no time to devour and made it unputdownable.
Would recommend to friends as it’s a well written story

DI Kelly Porter has her hands full in this first book in a new police procedural series where she is working for the Cumbria Constabulary. She'd been reprimanded for being too much of a risk-taker while working in London at the Met and had come back to her childhood home feeling like a failure.

There are, at her initial examination, 3 separate cases. A cold case involving a kidnapped and murdered 10-year old girl that she's asked to reopen. An abandoned baby whose hospitalized mother can't speak a word of English. And a well-known, wealthy civic leader found dead in a bed in a hotel room.

Porter has a lot to prove to her new team and she leads the investigation using the skills she learned from her mentor and partner at the Met -- patience, memory, order and time. The information gleaned by Porter makes her start to believe that the cases are related as the same names keep coming up. What she uncovers through this complex police operation is an illegal prostitution and slavery ring, global money-laundering and murder.

The book is very well-written and moves along quickly. The main character, Kelly Porter, is 36 years old and quite passionate about her work. She's the most fully developed as the story is told mainly from her point of view, but the secondary characters will likely be more fleshed out as the series develops. I'm eager to see what's next for her and the Constabulary team. The only thing that would have been helpful to me is a map -- as I am totally unfamiliar with the area and layout where Porter works! Seems like she had to do A LOT of driving from one place to another and the scenes were nicely described. Something that irritated me, but that is in essentially every book of this genre, is when the female detective goes in alone to a critical situation when she shouldn't and thus requires "rescue" from either a male partner or an entire police department. She should be smarter than that! But then, there wouldn't be the dramatic climax would there?! But it would be more realistic.

Thank you to NetGalley and Canelo Publishers for the e-book ARC to read and review. Definitely can't wait for the second book in this series and recommend it to anyone looking for a strong female protagonist in a police procedural.

The first in what I hope will be a new series featuring DI Kelly Porter who returns to her native Lake District from the Met. As she settles in she tackles cases that will make her revisit old relationships and family tensions. A great main plot with both a new and cold case to investigate and the beginnings of great sub plots in her personal life. More please!

This was a great read and what I hope is the first one in a series , Kelly goes home to that Lake District after a professional scandal causes her to leave her job in the Met . I loved the unusual setting , made a change for a crime novel not to be set in a city and it was all the better for this . Unfortunately she isn't in for a quite time , she investigates a cold case of a murdered 10 year old girl , meanwhile a respected business man is found dead in a shady hotel , a baby abandoned by a mother all of these threads slowly coming together . Although a lot of the content written about is very unsavoury , dog fighting , trafficking , prostitution to name but a few I really thought it was well written and not too gruesome . All in all a brilliant read and I really warmed to Kelly .... More please !!!

What a brilliant book this is! I could barely put it down. The plot wove together several different crimes that were interlinked and the characters were so well drawn. It was so gripping and exciting I really didn't want it to end. Even more shocking that it was set in the beautiful Lake District where you wouldn't imagine much goes on. Very excited that this is the start of a new series, can't wait to read the next one.

Thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an advance copy of this publication. I was particularly interested in this book for two reason, firslty I love holidaying in the Lake District so know where the plot takes place and secondly because I love this genre of book..
This book grabbed me from page one and i really enjoyed it. A great debut from Ms Lynch and I look forward to reading future pub;ications featuring Kelly Porter. If they are as good as this, I could see them being made into a TV series.

Crime thriller set in an idyllic part of the lakes alternates between a fairly pedestrian crime novel and a brutally violent thriller with lots of tedious descriptions of sex. I was plodding through it intending to finish it, but gave up at the point where the inept druggie was coerced into “making sure” the kidnapped middle-aged men took part in the illegal naked fight. No doubt designed to titillate the punters who didn’t find the illegal pit bull fighting enough to sate their desires. I had a terrible feeling the poor mens’ “flopping dicks and balls” wouldn’t last the round. Not my kind of book!

I really enjoyed reading Dark Game .It is a gritty dark police procedural story with DI Kelly Porter returning to her childhood home where she grew up to find everything has changed .She is the new kid on the block after working for the Met in London she is determined to prove herself worthy of the job .The story is fast paced reaching into the criminal world of prostitution and murder and much much more ,I thought the story was brilliantly told and can't wait to read more about DI Kelly Porter.

Kelly Porter has left the Met and transfers home to the Lake District, living with her mum and arguing with her sister. She is allocated a cold case - a youg girl who disappeared on a family outing and was found murdered. Then a local hotelier is found dead. A brothel industry is then discovered. Does anything link them all? This is a very cleverly written book with the story unravelling at a good pace. Some of the descriptions are quite graphic and very topical in todays world. It all comes together with an explosive ending. Look forward to reading more of this author.

After a scandal forces DI Kelly Porter out of the Met, she returns to her home in the Lake District. Crimes in the Cumbrian constabulary tend to be of the minor sort, but Kelly begins work on a cold case that shocked the local community – the abduction and brutal murder of ten-year-old Lottie Davies.
Meanwhile, Kelly is also investigating two seemingly straightforward crimes: a case involving an illegal immigrant, and a robbery following the death of local businessman Colin Day. But evidence comes to light that reveals a web of criminal activity beyond anything Kelly imagined involving people trafficking, the sex trade, money laundering and quite an array of unsavoury characters.
This is the first of a new series & a very good series opener. I look forward to reading more. I love a good thriller & this ticked all the boxes for me, a gritty storyline & plenty of suspense plus an engaging main character.

My honest review is for a special copy I voluntarily read

An excellent well written story set in the Lake District.
The storyline revolves around Kelly Porter a new DI recently returned to her hometown after working for the MET in London.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and found it very hard to put down.