Well written. with interesting characters and a good storyline.. Lots of twists and turns and kept me guessing until the very end. I would definitely recommend..
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to review it.

This was an interesting book with lots of twists, lies and misleading information. I enjoyed this book because it was well-written and drew me in but I had trouble connecting with the main character, DI Garibaldi, at some points. I found him a little irritating at times but at other times I could understand how he was feeling about certain things. However, while I warmed more to him as the book progressed, the characters I never warmed to at all were the people who had been at the quiz and were former students of Balfour College. I don’t feel I was meant to like these characters so I don’t have any concerns about stating that I didn’t. Some of them were trying to be something they weren’t and live up to someone else’s idea of what their lives should look like, and others were just entitled and arrogant, and honestly quite irritating.

Having said all of this it was interesting watching these characters interact with each other years after they were friends at university. It was also really interesting seeing them react to the events, accusations and everything else that was happening.

Overall I enjoyed this book. It was interesting watching the investigation progress and secrets be revealed. I found the ending felt more of a surprise than I expected it to be but it answered a lot of questions and that’s very important in an ending.

The Final Round presents the reader with a very different kind of police officer - DI Garibaldi has his quirks and can't drive. Still, he delves deep into the investigation to find who the killer is and why he committed the crime. The group of friends who were not really friends, the popular quiz but not with the kind of questions made, there are a lot of lies and misdirections that are fast-paced written till the truth is unveiled. Good entertainment!
I thank NetGalley for the free copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Quiz evenings are profoundly popular but perhaps this one wouldn’t be to so many people’s taste. Apart from one team’s members being perhaps a little too lively all seems to be going well. That is, until a parting announcement raises many doubts about the founding members of the event. Perhaps bad taste but nothing sinister until the murder of one of the participants the next day.
In ‘The Final Round’ O’Keeffe makes the reader bounce between feeling one of the main characters must be heavily involved in the murder to a feeling that perhaps their supposed ‘actions’ are merely misunderstandings that many of us could be guilty of.
Detective Inspector Garibaldi has the unfortunate task of trying to solve this murder and this is not straightforward, even at the end.
Whilst I found this dragged on a little from time to time, it did gather momentum and I wanted to know what had happened. So I would recommend this to those who like their detective murder investigations set in modern day.

Thank you to Muswell Press and NetGalley for this copy in exchange for an honest review.

Good hard to put down read. Suspense until the very end. Author has you gripped with this whodunit. Well written and enjoyed this book.

The Final Round is the first instalment in The Garibaldi series featuring country-music loving Detective Inspector Jim Garibaldi of the Metropolitan Police and set in a quiet London ‘village’ beside the Thames between Hammersmith and Richmond known as Barnes. He's a bit of an oddball with a love of books and music and an inability to drive. He is also half-Italian by descent and the owner of a complicated personal life. The plot is well-executed with plenty of twisty surprises and high-octane thriller thrown in for good measure you can't go wrong if looking for entertainment over realism.

The murder of one of the participants of an annual charity quiz is the latest case for Detective Inspector Garibaldi to solve. Of course there is a twist, when the final round of the quiz exposes some potentially embarrassing information, but could it be linked to the murder?

The Final Round is an entertaining and engaging read with a good twist at the end. Garibaldi is a unique, slightly pompous character although much less confident when it comes to romantic relationships.

Old University pals meet up once a year for a quiz night, but after this one, one of them is murdered. Who did it and why? Can Garibaldi find out the truth?
Well written book with interesting characters. Easy to read and enjoy. Highly recommend.

I received this book from the publisher through Netgalley for review and all thoughts and opinions are my own.
What a bumpy ride! Well written and delightful thriller. I read it straight through. Quiz night is a pub entertainment unfamiliar in the States. In pubs all over the UK, people gather to have a pint and test their knowledge on various subjects. It requires extensive knowledge and is highly competitive. On this occasion, several college alumni get together to celebrate 25 years, little knowing secrets will be outed and livelihoods threatened. It will end in murder. Setting and circumstances are unique in this fine mystery. Highly enjoyable reading experience.

A great premise and an all round good read.
I tried not to guess the murderer and I wasn't disappointed by the ending.
It was more 'Midsomer Murders' than 'Luther' in it's grit but That's fine by me. It made for an easy and entertaining read.
Many thanks

A solid four star read. Great premise. Well written. Good characters. Page turner. Plenty of suspense to keep me guessing Would definitely read his next novel. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to review it.

Entertaining and enjoyable mystery where I didn't guess the culprit! I'm really liking Garibaldi and hoping this is the first of many to feature him. Very good location too

My thanks to NetGalley and publisher Muswell Press for the ARC.

Set in and around Barnes in London. Six friends from Balfour College, Oxford receive invitations to Melissa's 25th anniversary Quiz night and, the couples immediately start comparing husbands, wives and children through various injustices in their lives since their college days and discussing whether they would go to the quiz. Nick Bellamy didn't have a partner but joined his college friends on one table that night. As the quiz comes to a close a voice from the speakers announces The Final Round - Melissa and husband Greg have no idea what's going on. The final round is for the audience to guess which were true of certain facts: reprehensible claims of wrong-doing were levelled at each of the college friends. Melissa and Greg try to cover up the nature of the accusations by trying to turn it into a joke.

In the following days the couples are on the phone to each other as they try to work out what's going on. Then, a week later, the day after the boat race on the Thames, Nick's body is found on a secluded path near the lake. The telephone lines are red-hot again amongst the couples as DI Jim Garibaldi starts the murder investigation. If the friends go to the police then they will have to give away certain secrets of their own.

This is a complex plot which incorporates several sub-plots which gradually come together with some surprising twists, although overall I found the pace of the book to be rather slow and the characters to be very shallow.

A good enough read.

Shortly after a charity quiz a man's body is found near the Thames. What makes it particularly unusual is that the tongue is cut out and an Oxford college scarf stuffed into the mouth. Body identification is easy. But the case is not. And the quiz ending is peculiar and unexpected. The team participants, Balfour college graduates, are accused of having committed acts from shoplifting to plagiarism to murder in their pasts. Is there a modicum of truth behind the accusations? Suspicion amongst them is rife as trust is broken down. The story is about how each character stands up under scrutiny and how layers of lies can shatter people.

Detective Garibaldi is in charge of the case. But his personal life is not without issues, too, which crop up in the novel. Several subplots intertwine but they are done well so only add, not detract. The story is chock full of fascinating twists and turns and drips with deceit.

The premise is excellent. The characters aren't really likeable to me but I needn't like characters to enjoy a book! The ending is a strong one, no disappointment there. Twists kept coming until the end.

My sincere thank you to Muswell Press and NetGalley for the privilege of reading the e-ARC of this riveting book.

I enjoyed reading this book, the characters were great and I enjoyed the mystery and trying to solve it. It was a great introduction to a new mystery series, I liked getting to know Detective DI Garibaldi and look forward to more in the series.

“Keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer.”

Righty Ho! I guess you know what’s coming now? That’s another new series added to my list, as I just can’t resist a good murder mystery / police procedural. It’s also not often that I manage to find myself meeting a cast of new characters right at the beginning of their literary journey, so I can’t miss out on this opportunity, can I?

The opening couple of pages really helped to set the scene for me, then it was straight into the action, followed by a very thorough and well described and detailed police investigation, leading to a climax which didn’t really end well for any one of the multiple suspects. Definitely food for my macabre sense of justice!

I really honed in and enjoyed the fact that the author took license from his previous occupation as a teacher, when casting his characters and including narrative detail to the storyline, which added a really nice personal touch! I also liked the fact that the story was set in a real place, with genuine street names and at tangible locations, which I could locate and follow on a map to plot the crime scene for myself.

A well constructed, multi-layered storyline, where plot and characters play an equal role as the backdrop to a police procedural, where Garibaldi eventually works out ‘whodunnit’, although I am still wondering exactly how he managed it, as there were so many crimes, so many suspects, so many red herrings and false leads, with the eventual outcome not making great closure for the police crime numbers!

The chapters are just the right length to keep the pace moving along at a steady rate, the story is very textured and intense, definitely not designed to put me at ease or feeling comfortable, as I spent most of my reading time sat on the edge of my seat and turning the pages ever more rapidly, as the lies just kept stacking up and my suspect list grew longer and longer. After one particular aspect of the case was solved quite early on, I whittled my list down to a more manageable number and I kind of worked out who the protagonist was, but not quite! You really do have to read this one right to the very end, as those final few twists and turns definitely make all the difference!

What can I say about the multi-faceted cast of suspect characters, which might even begin to put them into a good light. Bernard has done an excellent job of creating a whole group of people, none of which I would personally have minded being locked up for a very long time. How many times did they play the ‘When we were at Oxford’ or ‘When we left college’ card, as if they expected recognition of that to offer them special treatment or privileged interview rights! They really were an obnoxious, self-centred bunch, although peel back the superficial layers of self-importance and the artificial veneer of respectability and you were actually left with some very hollow shells of emotionally damaged humanity, unable to connect either with each other, or anyone outside of their circle, with any degree of synergy or interest and with zero genuine compassion.

I’m still in two minds about the character of Jim Garibaldi, although I am hoping for a lot more tangible character development in future stories, which might offer me a little more personality to invest in. Although it is never really discussed in too much detail, Garibaldi obviously has some pretty serious emotional baggage he is carrying around with him. However even making allowances for that, I really did get to the stage where I could have given him a good kick up the backside. As DI, he never took control of a case briefing, leaving that function to be fulfilled by his DCI. In fact he only really had direct contact with one member of his team, DS Milly Gardner, and that only because she is also his unofficial driver, as Garibaldi refuses to take a driving test. He actually spent much of the investigation fantasising about Millie and his DCI, Karen, when he wasn’t contemplating his own current love life. He is also rather too fond of letting everyone know how well-read he is and his vague, often almost disinterested attitude to the case, got to be quite annoying and irksome. However, somehow he did get to crack the case eventually and he handled a very traumatic and emotionally distressing climax, with some genuine empathy. In fact, his whole demeanour and rather ‘sans fait rien’ attitude, together with his eccentricities and constant lapses in concentration, almost put me in mind of a modern day Sherlock Holmes and I do hope that Bernard isn’t too appalled by that analogy!

Some seriously confident plot and character building paves the way for this new series, I can’t wait for the next ‘Garibaldi’ instalment, just so long as I can train myself to separate the man from the biscuit!

In the Barnes area of London, I think it is fairly safe to assume that – “The female of the species is more deadly than the male”

I thoroughly enjoyed meeting DI Jim Garibaldi and his colleagues. How refreshing to find a police procedural without too much backbiting and skullduggery amongst the ranks, stained clothes or sweaty officers; these people almost seemed normal.

It made a nice change for our hero to be quirky, but not outrageously so, and generally a decent man. The supporting characters were interesting but again without being extreme which is so often the case these days.

The "suspects" were without exception the complete antithesis of our hero and it was intriguing to see his mind working during his interviews when he cleverly misdirected and subtly provoked the interviewees.

It has been a while since I have read such a refreshing story and I look forward to reading more in the series in due courser. My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read the ARC

I started off thinking this would be a fantastic book. The story was intriguing and original and I was dying to know who the culprit was. After a while though, the characters began to get on my nerves. Five Oxford graduates, wealthy apart from one, pretending to be friends for 25 years when actually they all disliked each other intensely. Just the type of person I can’t stand! They attend an annual charity quiz and one of them is murdered shortly afterwards. DI Garibaldi is the hero who tracks down the killer eventually. I started to lose interest when the police procedures got too unbelievable, and that’s the main reason for my rating. Oh, and when a funeral was referred to as ‘this morning’s funeral’ and ‘the funeral yesterday’ on the same day and page. Careless mistake by the author, and not really important – but little things like that put me off! I enjoyed the writing style but towards the end it seemed rambling, as if the dialogues had been padded out unnecessarily to make the book longer. I did ‘quite’ enjoy it, and it’s a three and a half stars from me.

Six university friends see each other once a year for a trivia fund raising event, despite their ever-decreasing contact and familiarity. Then a dead body is found by the Thames and an unusual detective who can’t drive is assigned the case. The investigation is going nowhere and the friends lives and secrets begin to unravel as the mystery and possible connection deepen. A whodunnit which builds nicely and has great characters and revelations. A four-star read that is an appealing police procedure. As an independent reviewer, my thanks to the author for a copy gratis prior to publication. All opinions expressed herein are freely given and totally my own.

Oh the twist at the end! Love it! I admit I was slow to get into the whole reunion thing. I just don't get why folks can't let go of youthful friendships that go nowhere after school is done. But that is really the premise of much of the book. How the foolishness of youth colors adulthood. I do like the detective. He is full of normal human doubts and questions of life. Yet he sees the worst of humanity. I found him refreshing. I didn't like any of the main suspects. They were sure full of themselves. So it made a good story. I enjoyed the book.