The fourth DS Grave Allendale novel is a fast-reading police thriller that starts with a shocking knife murder of a sixteen year old girl walking the path to home with her best friend. The murder makes no sense at least until Grace starts digging into the dark underbelly of the city and the secret lives these young girls led. The story is a fast paced easy read despite to shocking subject matter.

Erin was a good girl. But someone wanted her dead…

Sixteen year olds Molly and Erin have been best friends since they were two and are inseperable, their mums, Lucy and Sara, are lifelong best friends too and live across the road from each other. When Molly bangs on Sara's door one night, screaming that Erin has been attacked in the alleyway minutes from their home, so begins every parent's worst nightmare, sadly Erin doesn't make it and dies on the way to hospital. Molly insists it was a random mugging gone wrong, DS Grace Allendale is convinced there's more to her story, but what is she keeping from them and who is she trying to protect? When they start digging they uncover some horrifying evidence that could explain a motive for Erin's murder. Her death and the events that follow sends shockwaves throughout the community and has a devastating effect on both families concerned. Grace and the team endeavour to find the person responsible and bring them to justice.

This latest crime thriller by Sherratt is told from various perspectives and switches between the current day with the team investigating the murder, and the events leading up to that day. What I love about this authors books is that her characters are real, down to earth people that you would be associated with every day in your own life, you connect with them like you're actually living alongside them and this makes them authentic. There are some very dark topics covered in this book, but they are done so with sensitivity and integrity, the plot is well crafted and seamless, with so many twists along the way that I gave up guessing in the end and just went with the flow, and what a cracking ending! This is the fourth in the DS Grace Allendale series and whilst it can be read as a standalone it's better to read them in order, to enable you to understand the background of Grace and her relationship with the Steele family. I've loved all the books in this series and this latest one is no exception.

I'd like to thank Avon Books and Netgalley for the approval, I will post my review on Goodreads now and Amazon on publication day.

This is book 4 in the DS Grace Allendale series. It could definitely be read as a standalone, but I recommend reading the others so you understand Grace's background, particularly when it comes to her connection with the Steele family.

In this instalment, Grace is called to the stabbing of a 16-year-old girl who had been walking home with her best friend when she was attacked just round the corner from her house.

The unfolding story, as Grace tries to find out what happened on the night Erin was attacked, uncovers a dark world that Grace is all too familiar with and has her locking horns with her estranged family once more.

Another well-paced story covering a disturbing topic really well and showing the realities of family grief from both sides. It is always good to come back into a series with such well-written characters. Grace is not your typical leading police detective and that makes her all the more interesting, as well as a good team that you look forward to catching up with.

A solid four star read. Good premise if a little disturbing at times due to storyline. Great characterisation. Plenty of suspense to keep me guessing. Would definitely read her next offering. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to review it.

Am a big Mel Sherratt fan.
This is the fourth in the DS Grace Allendale series set in Stoke.
A young girl Erin is attacked near her home and dies in her friend Molly’s arms but who attacked her and why?
Molly says it was a mugging and either of them could have died but is she telling the truth?
Grace must uncover what happened and why would someone attack a ‘good girl’ like Erin.
The story is a slow burner but builds up over the course of the book with lots of details and background.
Grace has an interesting family history and this gives additional interest to the reader and insights into Grace’s character.
The story moves between ‘now’ and ‘before’ and the reader finds out what was really going in Erin and Molly’s lives, dealing with some difficult topics along the way.
Enjoyable, well written police procedural story with a few twists and turns.
Thanks to #NetGalley and #Avonbooks for allowing me to read this book in return for a fair review. 4 Stars ⭐️

When 16-year-old Erin is murdered, DS Grace Allendale once again has to investigate her own corrupt family. As the investigation unfolds, so the girls’ parents and police team unearth exactly what Erin and her best friend, Molly, have been involved in recently. Much to their parents’ horror. The two had been drawn into the seedy world of sex, drugs and alcohol.
Molly, who was with Erin at the time of the murder, seems to be lying to the police. What is she hiding? Is she protecting someone? There were so many who seemed to have reason to kill Erin, complicating things for Grace and the team.
Good Girl exposes the horrible truth that parents often don’t know what’s going on under their very noses. So much of the girls’ behaviour, such as coming home drunk, was written off because they were teenagers. The mums, friends for years, remembered how they too had lied to their parents and got up to mischief when they were that age.
Worse, it shows just how easy it is for impressionable young girls to be taken in by older, seemingly rich and sophisticated men.
This is an action-packed read, full of tension, and once again Grace has to walk the tightrope between her corrupt, criminal family and her police family. Ultimately, though, this is a desperately sad book about child grooming, made even more so because it’s so prevalent in the real world.

Erin and Molly were best friends, living in the same street. They always hung out together at the local chippy café. Their mothers were also best friends, since school days. The death of Molly was a massive shock within the close-knit community.
What appeared to be a random mugging took a much more sinister turn.
As Grace and her team investigated, they dug deep. So many things were unearthed, many secrets. Erin and Molly were up to things that their families knew nothing about. It broke my heart at times. Feeling the despair of Erin’s family and the way it affected them, especially her little brother.
An old case seemed to be linked, one that Grace thought had been solved.
Grace is related to the Steele brothers who are very well known to the police in Stoke-on-Trent. Connected by their violent father, Grace and her mother escaped when she was young. There is always an underlying feeling of tension between her and the brothers when they creep into an investigation. There are lots of twists and turns in the plot, many suspicions, making it a real page-turner.
I like the way the story moved from present to past, so we could get an insight into what was really going on with Erin.
This was a brilliant ending to a fantastic, gritty series which I highly recommend.

Mel Sherratt offers an excellent crime thriller with robust writing skill. The narrative captures a multitude of dynamics surrounding dark, gritty topics that Sherratt portrays both respectfully and realistically. Each and every character is crafted with precision and the plot moves along effortlessly. As the story draws to a conclusion, readers are only left wanting more of DS Allendale.

Thank you to #NetGalley for the ARC of #GoodGirl which was read and reviewed voluntarily. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

#melsherratt #crimefiction #avonbooks #dsgraceallendale #bookish #tbralert #readreviewrepeat #bookstagram #bookblog #booktweets

would like to thank netgalley and the publisher for letting me read this brilliant book

erin and molly are best friends, they have been friends since birth, even their mothers had been childhood friends....an idealistic friendship but one of the girls will end up dead....stabbed to death


a brilliantly written and very topical storyline that will grab you from the first page and keep you shocked and sickened right to the end...

along the way we meet up with several characters that we know and love and a few new scrots along with way, but this book hooks you in and keeps you reading right till the end...

cant wait for the next book in this series

Aww. The end. Can you believe it? What a brilliant and thrill laden series Mel Sherratt has given to us with the Grace Allendale stories. I'll be sad not to be coming back to Grace and the team, but we really have seen the series rounded off in style, with shocks, thrills, secrets and the gripping storylines we've come to expect from this author.

This time we find Grace caught in the middle of an investigation into the murder of teenager, Erin Ellis. Out with her friend, Molly, for the evening, Erin is stabbed in a seemingly random mugging attack just steps away from her home. Her mother and best friend are left devastated, the community in shock. But what seems like a simple, if tragic case, is anything but, and once again Grace finds her personal life drawing uncomfortably close to the investigation, links back to her notorious half siblings making Grace's job all the more complex.

What I have loved about this series is the way that the author looks beyond the tangled web of the investigation and into the personal side of the characters too. Not just the police, although I have really enjoyed getting to know Grace and even her terrible family, but also they way in. which the lives of the victims and their families play a real part in the storyline. Even though we don't have a chance to meet Erin before she is murdered, by the end of the story we have a really clear idea of who she is, what made her tick and what led to her tragic death on the cold dark night. Using the present day investigation and some narrative scenes that take us back into Molly and Erin's pasts, Mel Sherratt sets the scene perfectly in a story that will make your skin crawl and highlights a story that is sadly all too believable and could easily have been ripped from the headlines.

There is a perfect blend of tension and emotion in this book. Mel Sherratt has pitched the tone perfectly, bringing Grace, and. the characters full circle in a way that will be clear to people who have read the whole series. For that reason, and because you'd be missing out on a real treat if you don't, I'd suggest not reading this book until you have read the first books. A lot of what plays out links into earlier stories and really do bring closure to some of. the more difficult storylines that first introduced us to Grace and her family. It is not always an easy read, a story of manipulation, abuse and deceit, and the build to the shocking final scenes really did hold my attention right to the end. And as for those very final pages - well what better way to round off the series. After all the sadness and shocks that preceded it, that ending was just what the reader ordered. Another cracking read that I'd heartily recommend.

This is the fourth book in the Grace Allendale series but can easily be read as a standalone. A 16 year old girl is murdered near to her home and Grace is investigating. Erin, the victim, is not all as she seems, as Grace soon discovers. There are so many good characters in this emotional tale, filled with twists, a good storyline and plenty drama. I would recommend this series to lovers of crime thrillers. Another good read by the author. Thanks to Net Galley for my ARC.

I have always enjoyed Mel Sherratts books and this was no exception.

Erin Ellis was with her best friend Molly when she was stabbed and killed aged only 16.
DS Grace Allendale has to find out who killed her and why.
She has her work cut out for her with no real leads and lots of secrets.

This book is fast paced and has you gripped from the beginning. Great characters that although is part of a series could still easily be read as a standalone.

Can’t wait for the next book.

This is book four of this series and, as usual, series rules apply. Although the main story is self contained, to get the very best from it, especially with regard to the main characters' background and development, do please start from book one and read in order.
In this book we follow the investigation of the death of 16 year old Erin Ellis who died in the arms of best friend Molly, after being attacked on their way home. Initially thought of as a mugging gone wrong, backed up by what Molly recalls of the event, DS Grace Allendale starts to investigate. But as she and her team start to gather background on the girls, as the parents start to open up about their increasingly strange recent behaviour, it soon becomes evident that there is so much more going on than on face value and it becomes a race against time to bring the perpetrators to justice. Things get tricky as certain elements of the case start to become familiar to Grace, she's seen this behaviour before and this can only mean one thing... her family could be involved...
I love this series. It gives me everything I need for a book of this genre. Great characters - both series and episode - acting out a cracking storyline that's both gripping and intriguing. All delivered at quite a pace with no superfluous padding or waffle. The book sucked me in right from the first page, held me captive throughout, spitting me out at the end completely satisfied.
All in all, a cracking addition to a now well established series. Roll on next time. My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

Molly and Erin have been best friends pretty much from birth. Their mothers are also best friends and have been since they were four years old. The death of Erin has an awful impact on both families. It soon becomes clear though that Erin’s death isn’t a straight forward mugging but something way more sinister than I could ever have envisioned.

This was a highly charged and at times, emotional read. Towards the end I have to admit to either tearing up or full on tears at certain parts. I got so wrapped up in this case that it was hard not to get emotionally involved.

The story flicks from present with Grace and the team working together on the case as well as to Molly and Erin in the run up to Erin’s murder. It makes for some harrowing reading that again had me go through so many emotions. Grace’s past is never far behind which causes her more issues and nothing is sadly ever straight forward.

Good Girl was a powerful read that really grabbed hold of me as well as making quite an impact. Its written in a way that the reader will struggle to put the book down and even when you do, all you can think about are the characters and the case. There are some jaw dropping moments that I hadn’t expected and boy was I literally on the edge of my seat as things really ramp up towards the end. This is one hard hitting crime thriller that packs more than a punch.

Complex murder thriller. Didn't find the story entirely believable,is it that easy for young girls to get taken in and behave in that way so quickly? The characters however were good and the story fast moving.

Good Girl is the latest instalment in the DS Grace Allendale series. Although it’s the fourth book I do believe it could be read as a stand-alone.

When sixteen year old Erin is stabbed, she dies in the arms of her best friend Molly. It seems it was a mugging gone wrong, but as Grace and her team investigate, it becomes apparent the girls were involved in something much more serious.

This book is tense, gripping and with twist and turns galore, you’ll find it hard to put down.

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon Books UK and the author for the chance to review.

Another fantastic read from Mel. This is book 4 in the Grace Allendale series and what a series. As usual I was gripped from page one. Grace and her boss Allie are called to the death of a young schoolgirl stabbed near her home. This case has lots of twists and turns to it leading Grace very close to home. I don’t want to spoil it by giving anything away but all I can say is it’s well worth reading this series you won’t be disappointed. A fab 5 star read.

A gritty ,powerfull realistic storyline that was so hard to put down . I love Grace Allendale she is one of my favourite female characters . Mel sherratt writes brilliant books which I have read most of and this one tops them . Hopefully there will be more jn the series

This is the 4th book in the Grace Allendale series but could be read as a stand-alone as Mel gives enough of the back story to help it make sense without having read the previous books.
In this book Grace and the team lead by Allie Shenton are investigating the brutal stabbing of 16;year old Erin Ellis, who was returning from a night out with her best friend and neighbour Molly.
Throughout the story you felt the emotion of all the characters and their shock at the murder and the revelations that are uncovered during the course of the investigation.
I once again enjoyed this story, however there were a couple of places where I felt it was a little repetitive but I was able to put that aside and not let it distract me too much.
Once again I would recommend this book.
Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book

GREAT book that pulls you in with good characterization, storyline & suspense to keep you guessing until the end. This police procedural involves investigating murder & the luring of young girls into the degrading realm of prostitution. Well written. Totally enjoyed. First time reading this author but will definitely backtrack for the other 3 in this series. RECOMMEND highly. Thanks to NetGalley & Avon publishing for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.