Get ready to drop everything to read this newest addition tothe Kate Burkholder series. All the elements are there - smarts, suspense, twists and turns In the trademark story that takes place in Amish country. The story starts off with an intense scene of a brutal murder and doesn't loosen its grip on the reader until the very end. It's surprising this is the 13th book of the series as it feels like the very first book that Linda Castillo put out. Her books never fail to excite every time.

Castillo is one of my favorite authors and this book did not disappoint. Another book involving Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and the staff of her department, and a rebellious teenager who returns to Painter's Mill after twelve years and is brutally murdered. I love reading about the Amish community and their culture and enjoy the sprinkling of Pennsylvania Dutch in the story, An enjoyable read. Thank you for the opportunity to read this ARC.

4.5⭐ This series keeps getting better. I can't believe this is #13! I love following Kate and her crew around. I love her and Tomasetti and I especially love learning more about the Amish. I had put the pieces outlined, but like Kate I couldn't put them together until the end. This one was a bit more graphic than some of the others, but it didn't take away anything from me. Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I really like this series! It was fast paced and had some unexpected twists. It was everything I’ve come to expect in her books. I enjoyed the story
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the early copy

Fallen by Linda Castillo is the 13th book in the Kate Burkholder series. It is a great crime mystery about a formerly Amish woman brutally murdered at a seedy motel in Painter’s Mill, Ohio. Kate Burkholder is the Police Chief in this community and is also previously Amish; upon arriving at the crime scene realizes that she recognizes the victim. The deceased victim, Rachael Schwartz, was a rebellious girl who was always was pushing boundaries left the Amish community. There are many twists and turns in this story; however, Kate and her fellow officers unravel all the sordid secrets to solve this case.
Thank you, NetGalley, for this ARC.

Many thanks to Netgalley, the author, and publisher for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book! Kate Burkholder books never disappoint. When a murdered young woman is found in a hotel room, Kate finds that she once knew the victim, and she, also, was formerly Amish. Her name is Rachael, and she no longer had many friends in Painter's Mill. Why was Rachael back in town? Who did she meet with. Kate must re-open old wounds and bring back bad memories with some of the townspeople to find out.

Linda Castillo is one of my favorite authors, She writes an Amish mystery like no other.

Kate Burkholder is the Chief of Police for Painters Mills, she has a small but competent staff that work very well together.

A young woman is found murdered in a local motel and much to the dismay of Kate she recognizes her to be a childhood friend, one who was not well fitted to the Amish life. With all that goes with a murder investigation much comes to light and secrets meant to be kept are opened up. As with all things in the past that are found out and in the middle of the investigation violence erupts again. Kate has her hands full with straddling both worlds, the Amish of her past and her duties of being Chief of Police. While Kate tries to find a murderer she must come to terms with her own past and her future.

As usual Castillo weaves a varied plot and try as you might it will be hard to figure out who the murderer is. The characters are well done and intriguing. It would be beneficial to start with the first book in this series but it is not necessary. This one will keep you up past midnight.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Linda Castillo was recommended to me by a small mom and pop bookshop. The owner gave me a lot of backstory about why Linda is unique! I was shocked when I started reading her books. Kate Burkeholder books flow together but it isn’t necessary to read them all to read this one. This is number 13 and my second in this series. She writes truly unique murder mysteries that involve Amish characters. Totally gritty and realistic and written really well. It will hook you and you’ll be running to grab all of her books!

Fallen is another Kate Burkholder novel with intriguing characters who have you turning pages quickly to find out what happens. A one time Amish girl who left her family to find fame and fortune comes back to town for an unknown reason and bad things happen everywhere. Kate and her lawman boyfriend try to get a handle on things but it is complicated. With an exciting ending, this is one of Castillo's best!!

I love Linda Castillo! I love her gritty, realistic stories. I love her ability to lead her readers to the end of the story and drop you off a cliff with the truth. Fallen does not disappoint. Castillo mixes the cultures of Amish and English smoothly in a way that it is easy to forget which world the characters belong to. Fallen tells the story of what happens when mistakes from the past come full circle. Don't get comfortable because you think you have everything figured out. Once again Kate Burkholder,police chief of Painters Mill and her staff, keep the reader involved and gives us just enough clues to hurry to the last page of the book.
I voluntarily received a copy of this book from NetGalley.

In this 13th book in the Kate Burkholder series, the Police Chief investigates the brutal murder of a woman she knew in the past. The book can be read as a standalone.

*****

Police Chief Kate Burkholder grew up in an Amish community in Painter's Mill, Ohio but left as a teenager. After Kate became a law enforcement officer, Painter's Mill offered her a job and she returned to head the police department. Kate's Amish background is advantageous because she speaks Pennsylvania Dutch and is familiar with Amish culture.

The story opens with the murder of thirtyish Rachael Schwartz, who was raised in an Amish family in Painter's Mill. Rachael was banned from the Amish community as a teenager, moved away, and lived a free-wheeling lifestyle. Now Rachael has returned to meet someone, and is brutally beaten to death in her motel room.

When Kate arrives at the crime scene she's shocked to realize she recognizes Rachael. Kate used to babysit Rachael, and the child was mischievous even as a youngster. Now Kate is horrified to see Rachael's battered body.

Kate and her team process the crime scene, search for the murder weapon, question people in the motel, etc. Kate also visits Rachael's parents and Rachael's childhood friend Loretta. There are flashbacks to the past, when Rachael and Loretta engaged in rebellious behavior like partying and drinking.

Loretta is now married with a family, and says she's had only sporadic contact with Rachael since she left, and doesn't know why Rachael came back. SOMEONE is afraid Loretta knows something, however, and threatens her to keep her mouth shut.

The usual favorite characters make an appearance, including Kate's boyfriend John Tomasetti, who works for the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, and Kate's police team: Glock, Pickles, Skid, T.J. and Mona (newly promoted from dispatcher to police officer).

I always like the peek into Amish customs, and the Pennsylvania Dutch phrases (which are translated). Linda Castillo doesn't shy away from sensational climaxes that endanger Kate's life, and the Police Chief gets in trouble once again.

For me, the ending stretches credulity a bit, but I enjoyed the book and recommend it to fans of the series and other mystery lovers.

Thanks to Netgalley, Linda Castillo and Minotaur Books for a copy of the book.

Another great read in the Kate Burkholder series. I love these books and this one continues to deliver. Quick flowing plot combined with good character development makes for a great read that I couldn’t put down!

Recommended for anyone who follows the series and great as a stand alone novel as well!

*I received an advanced reader’s copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review

I always enjoy this series and Fallen was no less interesting. The characters has truly evolved so Castillo seems able to delve even deeper into the Amish teachings. It's always enjoyable as well as informative.

I love Sheriff Kate Burkholder and her crew. Enjoy the glimpses into the Amish community, a community of which she was once a part. This one though was much more violent, viscous than her previous in series. Graphically so. My rating is lower than some, partly because of my previous sentence, but also because I couldn't make myself totally believe the who in the who done it. Not that I'll stop reading this series. I won't, but certainly hope the next is one in which I can more fully connect. Yes, and I know it's ridiculous to ask for a less viscous murder, but she has done it in the past and I hope she can in the future. Or at least less graphically described.


ARC from Edelweiss.

Well, another amazing addition to the story that is Kate Burkholder. I mean, amazing may be too much of a stretch, but I have to be honest, I love these books and I love Kate Burkholder. She is a well-written character who I have become very fond of and look forward to reading more about. This particular installment is really interesting and it kept me going from start to finish. I really dug the story and the development of the plot and seriously, after 13 books, the continued development of Kate. It isn't like she has stopped changing and developing, which I think is really incredible. She's still a dynamic character who is forced to face many different elements in her life. There were a couple of things in this installment that I was a little wary of, like, doesn't Kate Burkholder carry a stun-gun with her? If she doesn't, shouldn't she? Also, and this is more nitpicky than anything else, how is it possible for someone to face so much violence in such a small town? Maybe I don't have an idea of what people are capable of, or rather, don't hear about it, but this aspect of these novels is pretty over the top at times. I'm split on this because I truly love the character and the setting and the backdrop of the Amish (I'm quite taken with the whole religious ideology, so if anyone knows of some non-fiction around Amish life I'd be interested), but the fact that this stuff keeps happening over and over to Kate, well, sometimes that a hard pill to swallow. Regardless, I love the stories and will go back and read them all (one of my reading goals this year). All hail Kate Burkholder!

A fallen Amish woman is found bludgeoned to death in a Painter's Mill hotel room--more than a decade after she left town, flaunting her shame. No one knew she was visiting, nor why she would. Few missed her: the tell-all book had not painted any of the locals in a good light.

For Chief Kate Burkholder, this means a lot of suspects and way too few leads.. She had babysat this girl, once upon a time, so the crime hits far too close to home--and Kate must dig into the pasts of people who she would previously have considered entirely respectable.

Fallen, number 13 in the Kate Burkholder series, is very much an edge-of-your-seat read. Perhaps even more action-packed than Castillo's usual busy books, Fallen also brings new dimension to the series.

Another great Burkholder mystery. "Fallen" kept me on the edge of my seat, and I just had to keep reading to find out "whodunnit."

It's hard to believe there are now 13 books in the Kate Burkholder series by Linda Castillo. I still remember reading the first one when it was released years ago. I still enjoy the characters and the stories.

This time, the latest murder victim in Painted Hollow is a former Amish woman who grew up with Police Chief Kate Burkholder. Rachael Schwartz never followed the rules - she was a daring, risk-taking, troubled woman who had left the Amish faith and was under the bann, meaning her family and former community were not supposed to have contact with her. After leaving Painters Mill, Rachael wrote a salacious tell-all book that was more focused on scandal than truth. It was not a secret that the book ruffled feathers. So why did Rachael come back to her hometown? And who murdered her when it seems nobody even knew she was in town?

Switching between the past and a night in Rachael's teenaged life, this book will have readers guessing what happened that night years ago and how she wound up dead in the present time.

Kate is one of my favorite detectives in any mystery series. She's realistic because she has flaws, a complicated past, and is a trauma survivor. I'm also a big fan of her romantic partner, John Tomasetti from the state BCI. The tension and distrust that often exists between the Amish community and the Englishers makes a compelling narrative and leaves open the prospect of many more books in the series. I will definitely be reading them!

As of 2020, Ohio boasted the second largest population of Amish (sandwiched between the border states of Pennsylvania, which ranks first, and Indiana at third), according to multiple sources. There are plenty in my neck of the woods, and I've been to Holmes County, Ohio, the site of the Buckeye State's largest settlement and the setting for this book. I've always had an interest in Amish culture and beliefs; combine that with a good old-fashioned police story and a strong woman leading the investigation, and this book had me from the giddyup.

That woman is Kate Burkholder, who was born Amish but left the order and now serves as police chief in Painters Mill. With significant other John Tomasetti, an Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation officer, she lives in Wooster (yep, been there and no doubt passed their house several times). Serious crimes here are few and far between, but that streak comes to an abrupt end when Kate is called to a local motel room, where the badly beaten body of a woman has been found. Turns out it's Rachael Schwartz, whose nonconformist behavior got her thrown out of the Amish fold as a rebellious teenager. She hasn't returned home since, as far as anyone knows - so what brought her back and who would want to kill her?

As the investigation progresses, Kate gets help from her sweetie Tomasetti, the state and county cops, and the consensus is that Rachael's wild behavior made her far more enemies than friends (whether they be Amish or English). In fact, a local Amish woman seems to be the only person who can tolerate Rachael - and she claims to not have seen her for quite some time. Not long ago, Rachael wrote an expose book on life within her former Amish community; needless to say, it ruffled quite a few feathers, especially within a local splinter group that, for the most part, isn't much loved by the "regular" Amish .

With so many possible suspects - even Rachael's business partner wasn't all that fond of her, for goodness sake - it's hard for Kate to nail down solid clues. As she bounces around, though, it becomes clear that somebody wants her to stop - and just may be willing to go to great lengths to make sure she does exactly that. There's plenty of action in this, the 13th book in the series, as well as a couple of twists (one I pretty much saw coming and the other not at all). My only frustration, if you can call it that, is the (to me) excessive use of Amish phrases followed by English translations. On the one hand that's a much-appreciated feature for someone like me who wants to learn, but there were just too many and, Mein Gott, several that in context really didn't need an explanation.

That said, I thoroughly enjoyed the book - and Kate - so much so that I plan to follow this series from now on. Many thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review a pre-release copy.

Thank you NetGalley for the digital copy and thanks to Goodreads for the giveaway of the advance readers edition! As always, Linda Castillo didn’t disappoint. If you haven’t read this series, you are missing out! My favorite quote from this book is on page 88. Children are the only treasure you can take to Heaven. Not going to try to give too much away but I am still not happy with who the actual killer was.