I am so down for a good thriller, but sadly not all books labeled thriller really are, or at least not to me. <i>The Sinner</i>, however, really met the criteria! Tom Killgannon is an ex-undercover cop who ended up being in witness protection. However, when a convicted child killer is imprisoned but won't divulge where he buried them, a task force headed by Detective Sergeant Sheridan missions Tom to get the serial killer to divulge where he buried the last victims. Problem is, Tom must do it while inside Blackmorr Prison. UNDERCOVER...that word alone sets him up for danger. First, being an ex-cop puts a huge target on his back if he's discovered. Second, doing undercover while inside prison is obviously very dangerous, especially if he gets caught. But there is a very good reason that Tom is the one man who is best to get the job done.

I thought the character development was done really well. Characterization is super important to me when reading books, and if they're unconvincing then I just can't buy into the plot. But Martyn Waites did a very good job so the characters resonated with me in different ways.

I also really liked the short chapters because (like with James Patterson's books) I feel like I'm getting something read very quickly and I truly believe it somehow speeds up my reading. Of course, that's not imperative to a good book but it helps me!

I highly recommend this book but I'd like to add this: if you do read it, please be sure to read the author's notes after you finish the book. They're very interesting and helped me to appreciate the book even more.

The Sinner is the second Tom Killgannon book. I did not know this heading into the book, but it does read like a stand-alone, and isn’t an issue if you haven’t read the first book.

The Sinner follows Tom Killgannon, ex-cop who is called back into service to go undercover at a prison. His aim is to befriend a notorious child killer, and try to find out information on where the bodies had been buried. When he arrives at the prison, a gangster who he helped put away recognized him and Tom’s life is in danger. When Tom reaches out for help, he can’t reach the local police force, and begins to wonder as to the real reason he’s in Blackmoor prison.

I enjoyed this. It reads like a lot of police thrillers, and I didn’t find anything groundbreaking or new, but it was a solid, fun read. There was the right amount of background for Tom, and the gangster who recognized him. The twists were interesting and kept the story moving, but were mostly predictable. All in all, it was a quick read that kept me interested but won’t be one that I’ll think about for years to come. I will be on the lookout for other books by Martyn Waites though, as I enjoyed his straightforward writing style and his character building.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the ebook. Interesting story. The cover is really cool. It is a good mystery/drama/suspense.

I really enjoyed this book. It was exciting. Very well written. The plot was great. Highly recommend

This book was scarier than I thought it would be. It wasn't scary be it did have some creepy vibes that had me thinking I would have nightmares.

The writing was great and the story was original. I will definitely be picking up more by this author.

I was very excited to get a chance to read this book and I was not let down. I enjoyed the thriller very much! I really liked the ending and the characters were exciting and deep to me. I have not read book one but I did not feel like I needed it for this book. I think I will looked into more books from this author because I enjoyed this one so much. *This book was given to me for free at my request from NetGalley and I provided this voluntary review.*

Martyn Waites has done it again with The Sinner, the second book in the Tom Killgannon series. After reading The Old Religion, the first book in the series, which I loved – I have been waiting for the second book and loved it just as much. Waites needs to keep them coming! #TheSinner #NetGalley

Oooh, I'm a sucker for these books. The many layers of this mystery sucked me in and I couldn't put it down. Really great read.

WOW! After the first book in the Tom Killgannon series, I did not expect the second book to be this good. The Sinner can be read as a stand alone, but the first book, THE OLD RELIGION, is a top rate thriller too. Martyn Waites has managed to check off every item on a thriller genre lover's checklist.

First, introductions. Tom Killgannon is a retired undercover policeman who testified against the head of Manchester's illegal drug kingdom. He now is in witness protection, Tom Killgannon is not his real name, and has settled into his new life and new identity. This is his backstory. The Killgannon character is very well developed and this reader quickly became a fan of this hero.
Tom's police contacts use personal blackmail to coerce him into going undercover to obtain information from a convicted child killer. The information they provide says the undercover operation will be a short one. They lied. Tom will find himself face to face with the drug lord he help convict while he is unable to abort his operation. Anything you can imagine to happen, well, it does. The story is full of action, suspense, tension and has so many surprises you would think Waites is a magician. Again, WOW!

With the second book such a wild read, it's hard to imagine how Waites will be able to top the first two.

Following on from the stunning first Tom Kilgannon book, The Old Religion, The Sinner is a book I’ve been wanting to read for a while. Readers don’t need to have read the first book, The Sinner works fine as a stand-alone.

Kilgannon is in witness protection in Cornwall but as a former police officer, he knows that he can be called back to duty if circumstances require it. So when DS Sheridan and DC Blake come to see him, they make it clear that his skills are required for an undercover job.

A child killer is currently serving life in Blackmoor prison and the authorities are keen to get him to say where he buried the bodies so that the families may get a degree of closure and be able to bury their children.

Kilgannon reluctantly agrees, but he’s not been in Blackmoor for long before he realises that he is inside with a dangerous enemy. Dean Foley is a hardened criminal and Tom is the man responsible for his sentence. Not only that, but Foley is the reason that Tom is in witness protection.

As not even the prison Governor is aware of his true identity, Kilgannon realises he has to make contact with his police handlers and get out fast. But DS Sheridan is adamant that Kilgannon has to see his role through and cuts off contact. Something is rotten in this relationship, but Kilgannon has more urgent things to deal with as it soon becomes apparent that Foley is the one who is really running this prison.

Not knowing who, if anyone, he can trust, Kilgannon must battle to survive in a deeply hostile climate whilst winning the trust of a child killer and hoping that he can find a way out of this situation.

Meanwhile, he has two people in Cornwall that he has left behind, one of them very vulnerable, but they stand out as pawns in a battle to get Kilgannon to do what his tormentors ask.

The Sinner does require a bit of a leap into suspension of disbelief, but once you have made the jump this is a fast-paced and thrilling read full of cross and double cross, duplicity, manipulation, lies and surprising twists.

Waites is excellent at conveying a nightmare scenario and then managing to ramp that up until it literally captures the reader’s breath as we wait for the devastating impact of events to strike.

His knowledge of prisons is very clear as he portrays a strong and convincing claustrophobic atmosphere in which alliances are everything and the price of life is as cheap as a packet of fags.

Verdict: Beautifully written, dark, tense and suspenseful with more thrills and spills than you could ask for. Well thought through psychology and a clear narrative structure infuse a classic cat and mouse game to expose double dealing and provide some surprising and dramatic moments.

Someone didn't do their homework when they picked Tom to go undercover in Broasdmoor prison to coax information out of convicted child murderer Noel Cunningham. Tom has been in witness protection, living peacefully in Cornwall, since he helped convict organized crime creep Dean Foley. Guess who is more or less running Broadmoor? Not only is Tom sharing a cell with Noel, the prison authorities don't know who he is, and both these situations make for tension. That's before the murders start. It's an interesting conceit and one that Waites has neatly pulled off. I had not read the first book and this was fine as a standalone. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A nifty thriller.

After being arrested myself I can contest to the quote the front of the book. That not all those in prison are guilty. I have to say that this is one of the most suspenseful titles that I have read in some time. This was so perfect and creepy and dark and totally relentless!

2.5⭐️

This story is a thriller, about a retired undercover cop, who is suddenly thrust out of retirement. He is forced to take a job befriending a serial killer, in order to get information the local cops, desperately want. However, a dangerous mistake has taken place, can he get what he come for or lose everything.
I gave this story a 2.5 stars. The beginning of the story was great, pulled you in with a ton of suspense right off. After the first several chapters, it became a bit dull at times. I think that the author missed several opportunities to add action, to keep the story going and to keep reader engaged. Finally, the end was flat. I waited the whole book for a dramatic end and there was one, but not one I expected. This is usually good, but I did not like how it played out. The writing was good, very descriptive. We switched perspectives a number of times as well as going from past and present, which became confusing at times because uncover cop had multiple names through story, making it hard to keep him straight. Trigger warnings include, sexual explicit , murder, drugs and grief. I received this ebook via Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to Netgalley and Blackstone publishing for providing me with a copy of The Sinner in exchange for an honest review.
I was excited when I saw that my request to read this one was approved. I love Waites' books under the Tania Carver pseudonym, and I liked the first book in this series, too. Folk horror isn't really my thing, though, so I was stoked to find out that the setting was completely different, and a prison, at that. (I blame Different Seasons for my fascination with prison-based stories, haha.)
This was one intense read. Very entertaining, straightforward but carefully plotted, fast-paced, nerve-wracking and suitable mysterious, it is a perfect airplane read. The prision setting amped up the tension, with threats to the protagonist coming from all directions. At the same time, the secondary plot (involving his attempts to gain knowledge about the whereabouts of victims' remains from a prolific but weirdly compelling killer) was almost even more interesting.
But hoo boy, that nasty twist in the middle! Really? Really?! It didn't exactly come out of nowhere, but close, and it was such a shock. Usually that sort of thing feels kind if cheap to me, but this time it kind of worked? It definitely got a reaction out of me. I was so mad! I needed to know what was going to happen next. And the way it all played out slwas surprisingly satisfying. There was one or two small final shock reveals at the end to entice the reader into wanting more. It worked.
The Sinner was a good read, and I feel lucky to have been able to check out the ARC. Looking forward to the next Killgannon story!

Martyn Waites is one of my favorite authors. The Sinner is another excellent book. Twists and turns, nerve wracking moments and suspenseful to the point that I kept physically tensing up at times, this is a great thriller of you've got a few hours to devote to it. You won't want to stop once you read the first chapter!