This is the fifth book in the series featuring Detective Gina Harte and wow, what a book! It’s set in Cleevesford in Warwickshire. Gina and her team work extremely hard and always aim to solve the cases that come their way. Occasionally, the odd case hits a bit too close to home for comfort.

Susan and Ryan had once been madly in love, then they had a daughter Phoebe, followed by another daughter Jasmine. Things were not the same then. After a few years, baby Rory came along, he’s now two and at nursery. Things have got so bad that Susan and Ryan are divorcing and have split up. Ryan picked up the girls but after six o’clock that evening Susan hadn’t been to pick Rory up from nursery. The nursery rang her mum, Mary. She went to collect him. After speaking to Ryan the next day and finding out he hadn’t heard from her either, she called the police to report her missing. She wouldn’t leave her children.

Detective Inspector Gina Harte spoke to Mary to get some details and said they would look for her but she could feel there was something that was being kept from her. Mary didn’t tell her that Susan had run away as a teenager, then had been a troublemaker when she returned. She feared they wouldn’t look for her.

When Ryan spoke to Gina, he painted a completely different picture of Susan and didn’t seem bothered that she was missing. They found part of her diary and tried to work out her movements on the day she disappeared. When Mary checked her house further and found a box with some dark drawings inside, she rang Gina. There were things Mary didn’t know about her daughter. Then a man from Susan’s past is found murdered in the park. Has Susan vanished because she is a victim? Or because she is a suspect?

I really enjoyed reading this book, so much so I read it in a day! The story line flows, is descriptive and immensely gripping.I rated it 5/5 and I am already looking forward to the next book as this is a series I enjoy reading. Carla Kovach is a great author.

Her Dark Heart by Carla Kovach is the 5th in the Detective Gina Harte series.

First, let me thank NetGalley, the publisher Bookouture, and of course the author, for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Series Background: (Warning – May contain spoilers from previous books)
DI Gina Harte works homicides. Her team consists of: DS Jacob Driscoll, DC Harry O’Connor and DC Paula Wyre, with a lot of assistance from PC Smith, and now PC Kapoor. Gina is a stubborn lady, and a determined detective. She has had a rough life, which led to an uneasy relationship with her daughter and grand-daughter.  It has also led to a lack of real friends, and an on-again/off-again relationship with her boss, DCI Chris Briggs. It is not common knowledge that her husband was abusive, and no one knows that she helped him fall to his death many years ago.


My Synopsis: (No major reveals, but if concerned, skip to My Opinions)

Gina is searching for a missing woman, and it isn't easy.  People are hiding information from her and the team.

Susan Wheeler failed to pick up her young son Rory from school on Tuesday, and didn't pick up her older daughters from their fathers that evening.  Susan's mother Mary finally called the police on Wednesday, although neither her husband nor her daughter Clare thought she should.  Susan's soon-to-be ex-husband, thinks she just ran away again. Susan has been going through a rough divorce, and her husband Ryan places all the blame on her.   Clare also blames her sister for everything that went wrong with her own life.  But Susan's mother is sure there is something wrong.

When the body of a man that Susan had an appointment to see on Tuesday turns up dead, the urgency to find Susan escalates.

Meanwhile, Gina's thoughts are travelling back to her own disaster of a marriage, and back to her mother, who she regrets not spending more time with.  She needs to move on, but she isn't sure how.



My Opinions:

I am really enjoying this series.  I love Gina, although her personal struggles sometimes seem a little overwhelming.  It looks like things may turn around now.  Kovach has created a very deep and likeable character in Gina, which makes the reader really root for her.  She really cares about her cases, often to her own detriment. 

On the matter of the other characters in this one, I didn't really like any of the victim's family.   I thought Clare and her son were just obnoxious, Ryan was ignorant, and the mother overly guilt-ridden.  They all just angered me and took a bit away from the story.

I like how the story was told from multiple points of view, including that of the perpetrator.

The plot was dark, but the twists were good...I definitely did not see the identity of the perpetrators.  There was no fore-shadowing.  Good move!

I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next....

My Rating: 4.5 Stars

When Susan, divorced mother of three, disappears, there are mixed reactions. On the one hand, her mother Mary is very concerned. Conversely, her sister Clare is perturbed and is certain that Susan's disappearance is a repeat of her past actions.

Detective Gina Harte is on the scene, hoping to discover what happened to Susan. She makes more than one visit to the family, including Susan's ex-husband, and Mary's home. Currently, Susan's ex is caring for their two daughters, and Mary has the couple's young son. Meanwhile, Clare and her son are living at home with Mary and her husband. Tensions are definitely on the rise, especially as Clare's feelings towards Susan are made clear.

Mary has secreted some things from the police, things she found while searching her daughter's home. She unearthed Susan's diary and reluctantly shares information with Gina. Susan had been hiding secrets from her past, and the investigation leads to the body of a man somehow connected to Susan. Gina cannot help but wonder, is Susan a victim or guilty of the man's murder? Is her disappearance much more than meets the eye?

Meanwhile, the story shifts back and forth between the search for Susan, while at the same time sharing the perspective of the guilty party, with more than one victim ending up in danger. Despite these entries, I was completely surprised as to what was eventually revealed.

What a riveting story! The dual timelines were intriguing, especially when the mystery element became rather thrilling. Meanwhile, the family drama was compelling. And the conclusion, shocking beyond belief! This is the fifth book in the Detective Gina Harte series. Having had the opportunity to read the previous two titles, I have come to admire Gina and her work ethic. I look forward to continuing with this series.

Many thanks to Bookouture and to NetGalley for this ARC for review. This is my honest opinion.

Secrets and lies galore: compelling kidnapping thriller😲
4.5🌟stars
👍👍 I did not know whodunit until the big reveal, but the road to the reveal was twisted and tantalizing. This was my first time reading a Gina Harte thriller and I think I will have to go back and read earlier books in the series because this heroine is complex and compelling.

Detective Inspector Gina Harte is one troubled cookie and a mother of three's sudden disappearance dredges up emotions she's been trying to tamp down. As more victims stack up, there are so many friends and family members with secrets, right down to missing Susan's mother Mary, stepfather Howard, and her older sister Clare. The author did a great job of making these characters come alive, right down to the chaos of a household with two active toddlers. A really gripping read.

Thanks to publisher Bookouture and NetGalley for providing a complimentary advance copy of the book; this is my voluntary and honest review.

This is the fifth book in the Detective Gina Harte series and the third book I have read from the series. Whilst it would be better to read the books in order, I believe they can all be read as standalone too.

This time Detective Gina Harte is investigating the disappearance of Susan Wheeler, mother of three children and recently separated from her husband. Susan is a bookkeeper so travels to people’s places of business or their homes. Her mother wasn’t happy about her line of work, believing that she was putting herself in danger.

Her sister Clare believes that Susan has just taken off like she used to do throughout her teenage years, but Gina and her mother are not so sure believing she wouldn’t have left her three children like that.

Has Susan been kidnapped? Is the culprit one of her clients or could it be someone from her past?

I’ve adored the character of Gina Harte since I read book three in the series, ‘Her Pretty Bones‘ back in January. I love the way she works and dark cases she covers. I also loved in the previous books how the plot focused on the crime and not on Gina’s private life. However, this book had a lot of Gina’s private life in it, especially her past as Susan’s mother reminded Gina of her mother who died a little while ago. I have to say I prefer to keep the plot on the crime as I found these sections a little distracting.

That being said, I was fully invested in the story and held captive to the pages as the plot slowing unravelled itself and Susan’s past life came out via her diary and a box of her things.

I enjoyed getting to read sections from the person keeping Susan and also Gina’s conflict as a man named in Susan’s diary turns up dead, could Susan be to blame for his death?

The conclusion was satisfying and shocking too. This is an edge of your seat thriller that was a little slower than the previous books in the series but just as exciting.

The latest Detective Gina Harte psychological thriller ! A deliciously intense and brilliant thriller that will keep you guessing till the end with a shocking conclusion ! A must read ! Thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for the opportunity to read and review this book ! #Netgalley #Bookouture # HerDarkHeart

Susan Wheeler disappears, leaving her children behind. She is recently divorced and he has no idea what happened to her .. so he says.

Susan's mom finds her diary and finds clues to a dark secret from her childhood. Investigating the names in her diary, Detective Gina Harte and her team find a man's body ... a childhood friend of Susan's... one she saw the same day she disappeared.

Is Susan a victim ... or a suspect?

And then one of Susan's daughters disappear.....

Well-written, this is a real page turner. The mystery is baffling, with multiple twists and turns. Suspense starts on the first page and holds a nice pace until the very unexpected ending. Although 5th in the series, this is easily read as a stand alone. As always, I recommend starting at the beginning.

Many thanks to the author / Bookouture / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

Susan's life of fear with Ryan is spelled out in the Prologue to this gripping new thriller.
Months later, Susan has started divorce proceedings and trying to build a new life for herself and her 3 children..
Then something happens. Susan does not turn up to collect her little boy from nursery school. Frantic, they call Susan's mother Mary to collect Rory.
Mary is already caring for her older daughter Clare and her troubled and disruptive 2-yr old Harrison.
But the next day, she has heard nothing from Susan and has to call the police.
D I Gina Harte and PC Kapoor take the case.
It soon becomes clear that Susan and those around her are hiding deep secrets from their past which have now caught up with them with deadly effect.
As the stakes increase, it becomes a race against time to find Susan before it too late.
Gina Harte's personal family history meshes with Mary's family story to create a web of secrets, guilt, regrets and deception. which are exposed to deadly effect.
This is a clever, relationship-based thriller which has the unexpected twists and revelations to keep the reader enthralled to the last page.

I’ve read several Carla Kovach novels and her latest, Her Dark Heart is not to be missed. It can be read as a stand alone story or book 5 in the Detective Gina Harte series. Like all Carla Kovach stories, this eerie psychological thriller will keep you guessing until the final chapter. Three childhood friends. 1 murder. 1 kidnapping. 1 detective wiling to risk everything to find answers, This twisted story will keep you on the edge of your seat. One of the few crimes thrillers that the villain can’t be identified until the reveal at the end of the story. 4 stars.

I have loved the D.I Gina Harte series and have read them in order. By the time I got to book 3 I was astounded to find that each book just got better and better. They also got darker! And Her Dark Heart is no exception.

Carla is a talent up there with Angela Marson and her D.I Kim Stone series. I love this one just as much and find myself getting excited for the next installment.

Harte and her team feel like old friends and I will continue to follow them and see where life and new cases take them. Hurry up book 6!

I love this series and it just keeps getting better and better.
Susan doesn’t pick her son up from nursery and her mum starts to worry that something has happened to her. Her husband and sister thinks she’s just done a disappearing act to take a break, but they couldn’t be more wrong.
Gina and the team are called to investigate and when a man’s body is discovered badly beaten they look for a link with Susan.
I loved the way this story came together and how the secrets and lies just kept coming!
Susan’s mum thought her family were close but through her worry for her daughter, her eyes are gradually opened towards her son in law.
Gina is dealing with her own problems but is desperate to find Susan and find the person behind it.
This is a gripping crime thriller that had me hooked throughout.
Thanks to Bookouture and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.

The author certainly had me wrongfooted here! She tricked me into believing the story would go into a certain direction and my brain feels half boiled because of the effort I did in trying to find out what was going on and the who and why.

When everything became clear, it's obvious that revenge is a dish best served cold. Really cold in this case.

DI Harte does not only have to race against the clock but she has her own personal battles to deal with as well. Her secret should remain hidden at all costs, but did she  or did she not make a fatal mistake?

Gina is not the only one with secrets. Sometimes the people closest to you are the ones you should be most aware of.

This is a great story that kept my grey matter very busy. 5 stars.

Thank you, Carla Kovach and Bookouture.

This definitely was a "dark" story! A real page turner. I was surprised to find out who the bad guys were, could not even guess this ending. This was my first book in this series and even though I read it without first reading the ones that came before, it was a great read. Will definitely look into more Books by Carla Kovach.

I actually have not read any other novels from Carla Kovach so I didn't know if I should be starting on book 5 but I am so happy that I did! I was able to really grasp how Gina Harte was like as a character and will definitely be reading more from Carla. Go ahead and read it because you will not regret it.

Although this book can be read as a stand alone story I did feel that I would have been more gripped if I had read the previous books.

I feel that the character was not well rounded enough in terms of background and was frustrated that I did not know more about DI Harte’s domestic abuse and relationship with her mother and daughter. I feel I would definitely understand these issues well if I had read the previous books.

I felt there was not enough hints to who the kidnapper was, usually in books like this you have an indication of possible people it could be. Having no clue meant that it was hard to understand the voice of the kidnapper.

It was a good read but didn’t grip me as much as I hoped, I think it would grip me more as part of the series but not as a stand alone book.

She took something from him, and he's come to get it back.

DI Gina Harte gets the call one evening -- a report of a missing woman. Mary Hudson tells Harte and PC Kapoor that her daughter, Susan, had failed to pick up her 2-year-old son from the nursery and did not pick up her two daughters from her soon-to-be ex husband as arranged. Mary is adamant that Susan adored her children and would not have left them voluntarily. Mary knows something has happened but her other daughter, Clare, thinks it's just Susan running off to get attention -- after all, she's done it before. DI Harte asks the questions and opens the investigation but she senses that the family is keeping secrets. The Cleevesford Police are taking the disappearance seriously, especially when the body of a male is found and declared a homicide. It seems that Dale Blair had a tenuous connection to Susan and the two were heard arguing on the day Susan vanished. As the police actively begin an in depth examination of Susan's life, new information comes to light that indicates that Susan had been involved in something very dark during her teen years and that her secrets are about to be revealed. Things heat up dramatically as the detectives get closer to figuring out what's going on but who is telling the truth? NO SPOILERS.

This was a complicated case and requires a lot of details to explain all of the pieces and people involved in this suspenseful crime thriller. DI Gina Harte is struggling with her own personal demons and still reeling from the death of her mother as well as trying to get her guilt under control and forgive herself for her own past. So, Gina knows how a person's unresolved past can haunt them and the lengths that someone will go through to keep their secrets hidden. I can only hope that she gets a solid breakthrough and will be on the path to complete healing so she can navigate a relationship and allow herself friendship or even love. I feel for her, I do, but let's agree she's tortured herself long enough and needs to "let it go." Now, as far as the other characters in this series -- I enjoy learning more about the members of Gina's team at the police department but we don't get much information about their lives outside their work. DCI Briggs is a complicated man, and Gina's boss, but I don't know if that relationship will ever work out! As far as the Hudson family -- what a train wreck there! I'd say they all need some serious therapy to deal with all their issues in the aftermath of their ordeals in this book. But, onward, I'm looking forward to book #6 to see what happens with Gina Harte in the next installment.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for this e-book ARC to read, review and recommend. I've read all the previous books in the series and suggest that any reader do the same before tackling this one.

This is a really good page turner which kept me guessing right up until the last page. Really well written and full of action it is compelling reading. I hope that there is more Gina Harte to come.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

How fabulous to start to read a Carla Kovach Gina Harte story and remember all the familiar characters. Good story, but I was wanting more on why the victim’s mother looked so much like Gina’s mother. I saw a couple of the plot twists coming, so maybe not the best in the series as I’m usually gripped till the end. Nice character development for Gina though.

I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoy anything in this series. The first three books were probably my favorite, but this one did not disappoint either. This book in particular can be read as a stand alone but I would highly suggest reading the other four books in the series.

Gina really fought her innermost demons in this book. It was really intense. This is one of those series that just really pulls you in and keeps you. I always look forward to the next installment.

I am just in love with the authors writing style. I am never ready for the end of these books. These books are fast paced but for stories like this one, it has to be. I love that these are the kind of books you read for the character. You want them to continue because of Gina and her struggles.

Thank you so much to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for allowing me to review this title.

I have read all the Gina Harte books and really enjoy the storylines. This one revolves around recently divorced mom of 3, Susan, who goes missing, but has an unstable past and possible enemies, so some aren't sure how to take the disappearance.

This was a twisty story with lots of surprises and fast pace overall. You don't need to have read the other books in the series to enjoy this one, but I do feel like each book goes a little deeper into Gina's personal life and I honestly don't know if that is necessary- I find myself wanting to get back to the story. I am somewhat intrigued by Gina's relationship with Briggs but was unenthused by the storyline about her guilt around her mother and her odd connection to Mary, who reminded her of her mother. I wish Kovach would spend less time on discussing Gina's personal demons- readers can still connect with her with less focus on those areas.

This was a fast read and I changed my mind a couple times about what I thought was going on. I found the story interesting and believable when it all came together. At the end of the day, not my favorite book in this series but definitely a good read.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing me an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.