When I started this book I wasn’t aware it was the second in the series but in my opinion it can be read as a stand-alone. This was a good read and I really enjoyed it.

Seventeen years ago Sean Hennessy was locked up for murdering his parents and hurting his sister. he has come to the end of his sentence and is still professing his innocence. A tv programme is being made about it and a local justice group has picked up his story. Frankies sister in law is one of the lawyers and asks Frankie for her input. Meanwhile two murders have taken place in the area and Frankies team have been called in. Working under immense pressure form the media and her superiors Frankie and the team are under immense pressure. Are the cases connected? What is the murderer trying to say?
This book was a good read. The tension builds up slowly and you can feel the pressure that Frankie is under. I look forward to meeting the team again.
Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review

I’d give this a 3.5 rather than a 3. I found this book really hard to get into, I don’t know why. Not enough happening at the beginning / middle and too much unnecessary description? I persevered and I will admit the final third got more exciting, even if I had half figured it all out already. A lot of swearing which I’m not sure was needed. I’m not a fan of the c word in my fiction! Interesting concept however not sure if fully executed, I think this was due to trying to tie all the storylines at that end.

Olivia Kiernan returns with another dark rollercoaster ride through the Irish criminal world. DCS Frankie Sheehan back on duty after the traumatic events in Too Close to Breath. For her second outing, Sheehan finds herself thrown head first into a grisly case far too close to home her liking, echoes of the past reverberating through to the present. Kiernan kicks of this dark novel with a double murder in a parish church close to Frankie Sheehan’s childhood home, while her sister-in-law asks her to help prove a man innocent who was convicted of the murder of his parents and attempted murder of his sister back when he was a teenager.

I was so happy to have the chance to read the follow up to one of the best books I had the pleasure of reading last year. And as a debut book it was unbelievable just how good it was, so much so it ended 2018 as one of my top books. Then came the difficult second book. The Killer in Me easily lives up to last year’s debut and possibly eclipses it.

The murders as they continue are dark, the mystery ever deepening and the cast of suspects wide ranging and seemingly lacking any real connection. Kiernan has crafted a fantastic, tense and enjoyable read. I was hooked from the very first page and found myself often thinking “just one more chapter!”. It was a quick read, the desire to uncover the secrets intertwined in this case driving my desire to keep reading headlong towards the final conclusion.

The Killer in Me is the perfect second book to rejoin Frankie Sheehan in her journey into the murky Irish underworld. I thoroughly enjoyed this wonderfully written police procedural. At no time did it ever feel bogged down in detail in an attempt to add false credibility to the facts of the criminal justice system. The sense of frustration felt by the officers as the case stalls is palpable and the frenetic energy as the case draws close to an end, the killer close to being unmasked is unmistakable. If I enjoyed Too Close to Breath, The Killer in Me was the perfect way to sate my thirst for more and has only stoked my desire to read more from Kiernan and see what comes next for Frankie and the team.

Chief Superintendent Frankie Sheehan is the leader of an elite crime unit of Dublin’s An Garda Síochána, known as The Bureau. She has been asked by her sister in law - who works for a human rights group called Justice Meets Justice – to look over the evidence and paperwork related to a horrific historic crime, where a teenager called Seán Hennessy was convicted of the savage murder of his mother and father, and the attempted murder of his young sister. Now, Hennessy has been released, and he is the latest cause célèbre for JMJ. Sheehan reluctantly agrees, but her attention is quickly diverted to a double murder.

Two bodies have been found in a church in the well-to-do coastal suburb of Clontarf. The victims are identified as a local woman and her husband, but their deaths seem strangely disconnected. Geraldine Shine has been stabbed, but her husband Alan was strangled, has been dead for much longer, and his corpse shows every sign of having been kept in a freezer.

Sheehan and her colleague Detective Baz Harwood are pulled every which way by a murder investigation which becomes more complicated when another body is found. Conor Sheridan has been shot, again kept in a freezer, but this time displayed at the edge of the beach, up against Clontarf’s sea wall. While looking like a mass of disconnected but tangled threads, the various strands of evidence – the CCTV footage, the forensic data, the human connections - seem to have defy the weaver’s comb which will straighten them into a recognisable pattern. When Sheehan gets a glimpse of what it all means, she realises with horror that it links to the Hennessy murders and, indirectly, to her own family.

Despite its grim subject matter, The Killer In Me is a thing of beauty. I have, sadly, never been to Dublin or spent serious time with Irish people, but Olivia Kiernan gives the dialogue, particularly when people are using the vernacular, a gentle lilt.

Kiernan never lets us forget, however what savagery through which, via the eyes of Frankie Sheehan, we are wading. Her immediate boss, Assistant Commissioner Jack Clancy, gives her this sombre warning.

“Be careful with this, Frankie. Sometimes when you look into the mouth of that kind of evil, it’s hard to look away. You think, give it another few moments, your eyes will adjust, you’ll see the bottom of that darkness, understand it. It’s alluring. Addictive. And while you’re standing there rooted to the spot, you’re not noticing the fucking shadow is closing over you and you’re disappearing.”

I don’t know if Dublin Noir is ‘a thing’, but if it does exist, then The Killer In Me is its apotheosis. By the by, it is also a master-class in how to write a convincing police procedural. Sheehan shares her modus operandi when interviewing a reluctant suspect:

“We rely on a man’s capacity to always think the worst couldn’t happen. That no matter what they tell us, they will be okay. And because humans want to believe that, eventually they do begin to talk. And when they do, a tongue-tied perp can morph into a grand orator.”

Dark, complex, brutal but full of compassion, The Killer In Me is breathtakingly good. It is published by riverrun (a literary imprint of Quercus) and is available now in all formats.

Chilling, thrilling, suspensful. This is my first Olivia Kiernan book but it won't be the last. Can't wait to read more from this author.

I just couldn't get on with this one and I'm afraid it's a rare (for me) did not finish. I don't think it's fair to publish "negative" reviews of netgalley titles so I'll keep my views the myself.

The Killer In Me is actually the second book featuring Frankie Sheehan but it works as a stand alone novel too as it isn’t too difficult to piece together the back story. Having never read a book by this author before, I was very much impressed and will definitely be checking out the first instalment now too. Frankie’s character is strong and very easy to like and you can’t help but want her to succeed. This book follows two cases side by side and captures your attention from the very first chapter. The police procedure is very authentic and I found this book very compelling in terms of the themes it explored.

With thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC, which I have thoroughly enjoyed reading.
This is the second book by Olivia Kiernan that I have read in the Frankie Sheehan series and they have both been excellent police thrillers. The storyline was excellent and well written and the characters are strongly developed. I look forward to reading more in the series in future.
Highly recommended.

A wrongful conviction and a quest to see if that is actually true.....gripping. If you like a story that has you guessing to the end then you’ll love this.
4/5 on goodreads.

This book was brilliant, full of twists and turns, mystery and intrigue. I loved the characters and the ending was brilliant.

I know this is only the second book in the series but I get a shiver of excitement each time a Frankie Sheehan book comes out. I love the pure Irishness of it and the duo of Frankie and Baz makes me very proud to be a keen reader of police procedurals. This is simply an honestly good drama and, more often than not, a great murder mystery to boot.

Frankie has her hands full with this one as a double murder just committed seems to have a linkage to a family murder committed 17 years ago. Coincidence unlikely when the person found guilty for that crime was only recently released from prison, with a documentary of his story currently in the offing. Could it be that easy? Frankie spends all hours investigating to find out.

What makes this series such a gem is the no nonsense way Frankie works. Baz seems to have a psychic link to her working in lockstep with her every move. They are such a strong and fun team - they put off a vibe like brother and sister who get on well. I love them to bits and would read anything featuring them tracking down the bad guys. I like the twisty intricacy of the 'Did he?' 'Didn't he?' that the investigation unveils and the wider avenues the story heads down. The Killer in Me is an excellent thriller that is sure to get your pulse racing in the finally throws, if not well before!

This is the second book to feature DCS Frankie Sheehan. I loved her first book Too Close To Breathe and awarded it five stars. I read this book in one sitting, I could not put it down. I actually finished this rollercoaster of a read at 2.30am. This is a dark read and in places had me sat on the edge of my seat . Heart racing, holding my breath and chilling me to the bone. This is definitely my type of book.
The plot was clever a cold case and a serial killer, what is the connection? I will tell you it was definitely not what I was expecting. I loved it, an easy five stars and so Highly Recommended.
I would like to thank the author, Quercus Books and Netgalley for the ARC in return for giving an honest review.

The second in the series but can easily be read as a stand-alone too- as we are given so much information and get to know the characters so well no matter what way round you read it. A fast paced, keep you guessing plot with really well thought out characters. I really enjoyed this and look forward to reading more of the authors work.

We met DCS Frankie Sheenan, knee deep and wading through bureaucracy with a commissioner breathing down her neck and the worry that budgets can be cut at any time. Frankie’s partner Barry Harwood aka Baz and Frankie very soon find themselves with a triple murder inquiry to solve – with little in the way of clues or suspects.

Any one questioned seems reluctant to give away too much information, including a Priest, for fear of breaking his vow of ‘confessions’ made staying only with him, including some extra information that’s vital to the case, despite this being a Murder enquiry, with the killer still on the lose.

The possible involvement of a freshly released convict, Sean Hennessy , who’s trying to overturn his conviction of 17 years to prove he did not murder his parents, with Tanya, a hotshot defense lawyer and Frankies Sister in Law helping him. Frankie can see that the evidence used against him, is negligible, that its flawed and that the Police dealing with the case at the time sought to imprison Sean Hennessey for a result, one of them being Jack Clancy – now the Assistant Commissioner. But by helping Tanya prove this, she could end up losing her job in lieu of a huge payout. Something she knows she cant let happen.

If you’ve read Olivia’s debut novel Too Close to Breathe then you’ve ‘met’ Detective Chief Superintendent Frankie Sheenan before. She’s tenacious, feisty, strong in mind and will, and ahead of her game – a female DCS for one and one that’s running The Burea of Serious Crime, four districts of the Gardai’s finest detectives in Dublin. You know she’s not going to let Sean, Tanya, Father Healy or anyone else stand in the way of finding out and revealing the truth. I found myself unsure who was breathing heavier at one point, Frankie or me, the detail that Olivia adds creates such an atmosphere of tension, like I was almost there on the beach with Frankie, the sound of the sea crashing around us. The way that Frankie visualises the murder scenes in her mind and pictures the victims, the smells, is a real talent and one that only adds to the plot for me.

Even if you haven’t, read Olivia’s Debut novel Too Close to Breathe I’m sure after reading The Killer In Me, you will soon find yourself with your head in the pages of Too Close to Breathe you will very soon have a good idea of Frankie and Baz’s partnership and how well they work together, covering each others backs (and arses) to solve these murders and save the Burea.

Book 2 in the Detective Chief Superintendent Frankie Sheehan series....
It's so important to love the main character in a series isn't it. Your at nothing if you don't...
I took to Frankie immediately. She's a strong, efficient and likeable character that wants to get the job done whatever it takes.
She's pulled in all directions while trying to solve the Shine murders..
What part if any does convicted murderer Sean Hennessy have in it all.....
Is he as innocent as he says....
You do need to have your wits about you reading this novel. It's so cleverly written with just the right nuggets of information released at the right time to keep you guessing....
It's has such a dark and incredibly intriguing storyline that kept me reading late into the night.....I just didn't want to put it down..
Well worth checking this one out....

Thank you kindly to Olivia Kiernan Author and her publishers Quercus Books for my copy of this book. Much appreciated....

The Killer In Me was one of those novel that demanded your attention, that had you glued to the sofa, incapable of moving until you turned the last page.

We met Detective Chief Superintendent Frankie Sheehan, a woman at the top of her profession, dedicated and good at what she did. You felt that had come at a price, no relationship and few friends, a practicability about her, emotions buried deep, until Kiernan gave us the odd glimpse. You doubted that she would have achieved so much without the focus and the dedication and it was the one thing that I admired about her, how she managed to maintain that balance of professional and personal. It was only when the personal began to creep into her murder investigation and her cold case, that we saw a blurring of the lines as the personal slowly crept in and it was interesting to see what direction Kiernan would take Sheehan, how she would handle it.

If Sheehen excelled at characterisation she was equally brilliant with her storylines. Her skilful handling of a current brutal murder investigation alongside that of a long ago potential injustice sat perfectly side by side, they made you want to read faster, to wonder if there were any connections, if the two would finally merge.

Nothing, is ever straightforward in the world of the murder novel and The Killer In Me was no different, but it had a distinct human element and explored themes of domestic abuse, of secrets hidden. It explored the psychological damage it can cause by what we see, what it can make us do and the repercussions it might have for us in the future. It allowed Kiernan to give the novel that extra edge as she plunged deep into the minds of the characters and I found it utterly fascinating. There were times when I thought I’d worked out what would happen next, who did what, only to have my theories thrown back at me as Kiernan almost seemed to do the opposite, teasing the reader with her little clues littered throughout.

When the truth was finally revealed it wasn’t far fetched nor unrealistic, it all made perfect sense and you could clearly see Kiernan’s reasoning and process. It certainly wasn’t a quiet ending but a deeply satisfying, one that tied up all the loose ends and left no stone unturned.

Having never read Kiernan before I was suitably impressed. The quality of writing, the structure was fantastic and I cannot wait to read the next instalment.

More than a little shamefaced I admit that this was my first Olivia Kiernan read… She and her first novel in the Frankie Sheehan series, Too Close To Breathe, were somewhere on my radar, but somehow I never got around to actually reading it. Well let me tell you, it is very high on my TBR list now! So you needn’t worry if you haven’t read book 1 in the series, I didn’t feel like I missed anything in terms of Frankie’s past or anything, but since chances are that you, like me, will want to read Too Close To Breathe when you’ve read The Killer In Me, you might as well read them in the correct order! So go ahead and treat yourself to an atmospheric thriller or two!!

I thoroughly enjoyed this story. Frankie is an awesome main character. She’s a profiler, a kick-ass detective, a woman who is passionate about her job.
The story kicks off with a gruesome dual murder that Frankie and her team need to solve, and in the meantime Frankie is asked by her sister-in-law to look into a murder case from 17 years ago. While the present-day case is an interesting one, it was the old case that absolutely fascinated me. It made me think of the Netflix documentary Making a Murderer, because I felt the same things reading about Seán Hennessey as I did when watching the Steven Avery / Brendan Dassey case in Making a Murderer: what is the truth, will we ever know if he did do it, was an innocent teenager sent to prison for crimes he didn’t commit? Because 17 years ago, Seán was convicted for murdering his parents and for causing grievous bodily harm to his little sister. And now he’s out and working on a documentary that’s supposed to prove his innocence. Cue Frankie, who doesn’t know what to believe. Though loyal to her colleagues, she has an innate sense of justice and I felt so much admiration for her drive to get to the bottom of what happened that day 17 years ago, while also trying to figure out who’s responsible for all the current murder and mayhem.

This was such an atmospheric read that drew me in right from the start and didn’t let me go until the final page. I feel that the Irish novels that I’ve read have this in common: they are often a bit dark, a bit raw, and this one was no different. I got some of the same vibes I tend to get from Tana French, but delivered in another style, one that (dare I say it) suits me better. A very entertaining read, not all that twisty, but rather steadily building up to a finale that came as quite a shock! Kudos to whomever figures it out, ’cause this humble blogger sure didn’t!

Highly recommended.

4.5 stars
The Killer In Me is another fantastically gripping thriller from a very talented author. I was immediately drawn into the story with the descriptions of a very intriguing and unusual murder scene which hinted at a different serial killer story then normal.

One of the things I most enjoyed about this book is the intimate, fly on the wall glimpse of the case. The reader is given access to every bit of evidence that the police uncover which makes you feel that you are there trying to solve the case among the detectives. I found this absolutely fascinating and enjoyed watching them trying to solve the case, whilst trying to work it out myself.

Alongside the already intriguing serial killer story is a reinvestigation into a cold case involving the slaughter of a local family, run by Frankie’s sister in law, which obviously confuses matters. Throughout the book old evidence is re-examined and I found it quite horrifying to see how many mistakes were made. There are some quite sensitive issues of domestic violence and mental health included in this book which might be a difficult read for some people. They are important to the story though as they help you to understand the characters and the case more. The reader is given the sense that the two are related and I had a lot of fun trying to figure out how.

The atmosphere in the book slowly builds as more bodies are found and there were lots of twists that kept me guessing. I found I really enjoyed watching Frankie work everything out and was completely absorbed in the story right up until the rather shocking ending.

Huge thanks to Milly Reid for inviting me onto the blog tour and to Quercus publishers for my copy of this book via Netgalley.

I rated this 4.5/5

Be prepared to wish you could read all day and flag life's responsibilities!!!! First read, and most definitely not the last, from this author and so happy that I could take part in this book blast. A thoroughly enthralling read, pace was fantastic and the writing felt very natural. There were a few plot twists I didn't see coming, one I did, and although there were no WTF moments for me, it certainly did make me think.

The lead character was interesting and likeable, let's face it, there's nothing worse that giving us a character who's the complete opposite! Frankie was fiesty, dedicated, and intelligent and I loved sharing the journey with her. The secondary characters were also enjoyable, I even "liked" the baddie *laughing* and by that I mean an excellently built character.

If you haven't read this then I absolutely encourage you to do so and make up your own mind. I don't think you'll be disappointed !