The Darkest Place is a new installment in the series with DCI Tom Reynolds and his team. A mass grave has been found in the grounds of St Christina's, a former psychiatric hospital situated on an island off the coast of Kerry. However one body turns out to be that of Doctor Conrad Howe, who mysteriously disappeared in 1972. What happened to the young doctor?

This book is an easy read full of twists and turns. All former staff are interviewed by the Garda team and it appears nobody can be trusted. There were horrific practices in the hospital in the 70's to which young Dr Howe objected. What exactly did he know? Who did he cross? What were his intentions with his newly acquired information? Everyone is a possible suspect. I enjoyed this book a lot and look forward to reading more by Jo Spain 4/5

I hate starting a series in the middle so before I read this book I read the previous three. What a great series. I especially like the fact that the gardai characters seem to be relatively normal human beings it adds a layer of reality to the story. The darkest place represents an old abandoned psychiatric hospital and some of the historical practices and descriptions are pretty grim but it adds a nice element of tension to the unfolding case. Jo Spain now has a firm place on my Irish crime writers to pre order list.

Good book to keep you on the edge of your seat. I hadn't read the rest in the series but that was ok. Good plot and well written

Big fan of all Jo Spain's books and this one didn't disappoint. Full of twists and turns to keep you guessing right to the very end.
Thanks you to the author and NetGalley for the ARC.

Thank you Netgalley and Quercus Books for the ARC.

The Darkest Place is a captivating murder mystery.
A mass grave is discovered near an abandoned asylum on a remote island off the Irish coast. There are dozens of bodies in bodybags, but one is wrapped in plastic, apparently the only one not having died a natural death. While the police investigates the reader is treated to parts of an old diary belonging to one of the doctors who once worked for the asylum. Slowly we discover the horrors that the insane were submitted to and why some of the staff stayed on the island long after the asylum closed.
The book has a good pace, with well described creepy characters and surroundings. Nothing is what it seems and the truth doesn't come out until the very end when we are treated to a twist I didn't see coming.
The mystery in all its darkness kept me glued to the pages.

Cracking good read!. A disappearance 40 years ago, an isolated island once housing a mental asylum and still housing some strange characters. A body found hidden in a mass grave. Atmospheric and gripping this is a great addition to this great series. Tom Reynolds and team are back. The subplot continues nicely as they try to find what happened to the Doctor who never made it home at Christmas

Very well paced, Jo continues to weave episodes from recent Irish history together with the traditional crime series format and she does it very sucessfully with a great sense of place

The fourth in a series of mysteries involving Inspector Tom Reynolds and his team in the Republic of Ireland.

What was ostensibly a 40-year old missing person case given to Tom by his boss to ensure failure, led the team to a mass grave at the former asylum of St Christina's on Oileán na Caillte. Gradually, the full horror of what had taken place there unfolded.

This is the first of Jo Spain's books that I have read, and I will certainly be reading the rest. A fast-paced tale, never dull nor predictable, with a most unexpected ending

I would like to thank Netgalley and Quercus Books for an advance copy of The Darkest Place, the fourth novel to feature DCI Tom Reynolds of the Dublin police.

Tom has been marginalised for the last six months so he is surprised by a phone call on Christmas Day asking him to investigate a cold case with a potential high profile. In a mass grave on a remote island formerly housing St Christina's insane asylum an extra body has been found which is strongly suspected to be Dr Conrad Howe, brother-in-law of a high court judge and missing for forty years. Tom and his wingman DS Ray Lennon set off for the island and what they discover there is horrific.

I thoroughly enjoyed The Darkest Place which is a gripping and intriguing mystery with some great twists in the tail (Ms Spain reserves her massive surprises for the denouement, and boy! was I caught off stride by her revelations). Some of my enjoyment was necessarily tempered by the horrific abuse the inmates suffered in the name of treatment. Not all of it was a surprise but I was shocked to learn that it was still going on in the 70s which I had always believed to be more progressive and even more shocked to learn how easily one could be sectioned. It's another institutional scandal waiting to be exposed. Kudos to Ms Spain for tackling it.

The plot itself, stripped of this background, is well done with plenty of suspects and motives and a steady stream of reveals and misdirection to keep the reader occupied and guessing. I found it gripping as the novel uses a present day timeline but fleshes out this narrative with excerpts from Howe's contemporaneous diary where he writes about his suspicions of an unnamed doctor's behaviour. It kept me guessing and hungry for more.

As befits a plot driven novel most of the characters aren't particularly well developed and are seen mostly through events, rather than thoughts. Tom has his problems with his boss, Chief Superintendent Joe Kennedy, and their interplay adds a frisson to the novel but the really interesting side plot is his involvement in the ongoing war between criminal psychologist, Linda, and chief CSI, Emmet. No spoilers but it's fascinating.

The Darkest Place is a good read which I have no hesitation in recommending.

This ticket a lot of boxes for me.
Creepy asylum with dodgy medical practices ✔
Cold case ✔
Abandoned asylum ✔
Staff that you can't seem to trust ✔
Remote island ✔
A diary slowly revealing all ✔

It came together nicely,springing a few surprises on the way.
Always shocking to read how patients were treated not that long ago.... 
Well told,with a good cast of characters that if now like to read more of.

This is the first Jo Spain book I've read, although I believe it is the fourth in the Inspector Tom Reynolds series. Reading it as a standalone was fine - any important elements of the back story, such as the relationships between the various characters, was explained.

This book is set mainly on an island where there was a psychiatric institution, a kind of remnant of the cruel and unpleasant Victorian asylum system. The hospital has been closed for decades when a mass grave is discovered and, even more disturbingly, a body that isn't supposed to be there. DCI Tom Reynolds, his career being sidelined by a feud within the police, is allocated to the cold case. Arriving on 'The Island of the Lost' with his team, he's faced with unravelling decades of lies and uncovering some highly dubious mental health practices.

This was an engaging read, although the horrific psychiatric treatments read like something from another century - shocking to think these were still in use in modern times. The mystery itself is cleverly plotted and there are some tense moments. I particularly liked the police psychologist as I felt that she was the warmest of the characters and one I thought could have been used more.

Overall, this is well worth a read, although what might stay with you longer than the story are the shocking mental health practices of the not-so-distant past. A well researched and well written detective story.

Interesting premise and insight into how patients were treated in insane asylums. Good character development throughout.

Well she has done it again absolutely amazing. Love the storyline and keeping up with Tom and crew. JO is a fabulous writer and thee most wonderful girl. so happy to have read this and been able to tell her personally

Well that title is spot on.

This takes you to a VERY dark place - an asylum on an island, only accessible by boat at ceertain times, tales of goodness knows what going on inside these walls. The asylum is only investigated when a doctor who used to work there, who went missing 40 years ago, is found in a mass grave on site and it's clear he's been murdered...

Well that was just the start. This has shades of Jo's other books but with a hint of Shutter Island and something from Stephen King. The whole visit to this island is creepy to the extreme - well it is an abandoned asylum for a start..but there are many people still living here, who used to work there. There 's a LOT of secrets, dark corners, strange noises and shadows passing across the wall. Seems to be a place where the sunshine is even scared of. This woman can build atmosphere like noone else. The scenes set in the past in particular when the asylum was a working institution are brrrrrrr illiant.

Put this on your TBR list and I think its apt that the book is out in September, as this book and the autumn shade are bound to join forces to create a very chilling reading experience!

I received a completely different book . When I downloaded to my kindle it wasn’t the correct book . Instead I reviewed the darkest place by Elly Griffith’s