Unfortunately I didn’t really enjoy reading this. It felt too disjointed, none of the characters were particularly likeable (a shoplifting detective?) and so you didn’t really care about them or root for them.

A few particular howlers for me…

“Malcolm’s Thomas Cromwell haircut stuck up on one side as if he’d gelled it then slept on it. Toni suspected Malcolm was into Tudor re-enactments, but he’d never said.”

The haircut gets several mentions, all were annoying.

“‘I know we’ve checked his bank accounts and found no record of paying for one. ‘Probably had a burner.’ ‘You’re right.’ Toni slapped her forehead. Duh. People having affairs lived like criminals, practised at deception.”

*headdesk* Oh come ON! Seriously?!

“‘It means Garry Haslem is the latest victim of the serial killer.’ Like the double act they were, Malcolm finished Toni’s sentence.”

What happened to “show, don’t tell”? This felt like a very amateur, inexperienced thing to write to demonstrate the point.

“Rex slathered a chunk of bread with a smear of ripe Brie.”

Is Rex Jesus now, with the feeding of the 5000? You can’t slather a smear, surely?

And finally…

“‘The day we resort to looking for motives, we’ll consider this investigation on life-support,’ Toni groaned. ‘Leave motive to the media and armchair detectives. We want hard evidence.’”

Admittedly I’m not a detective, but surely motive is important?

Ultimately a disappointing read that I probably should have DNFed, but by the time I considered it, I’d read too much and felt I had to at least salvage another book for my reading total. I am glad that some other people have enjoyed this, there will always be some who like a book and some who don’t - sadly this time I was one of the latter.

I received a free ARC copy of this via NetGalley and the publishers in return for an unbiased review. Apologies for the delay in providing this.

This is the second in a series but reads well as a standalone. There are a diverse cast of characters. It is written in the style of Christie. I felt a little let down by this book

DNF - This didn't end up being the style of book I was hoping to find which is not to say that it's a bad book. Rather, it simply wasn't the book for me.

A grisly murder in a gentle town, elements of Agatha Christie, and a female DI! A perfect idea for me. Didn't realise that it was a sort-of sequel to a previous book, i'll go back and read that I think.

Lesley Thomson's "The Companion" is a gripping murder mystery that starts off with an estranged couple and their son at a family day out in the countryside and then shifts its focus to the home of seven long-term residents - the luxurious Blacklock House.

With sharp plot turns and twists that will leave readers breathless, this novel is one of Thomson's finest works. Her writing style is tight, and the suspense level remains high as Detective Toni Kemp uncovers the secrets behind the gruesome double stabbing of James Ritchie and Wilbur, which turns out to be a bigger mystery than anticipated.

Set in a beautiful and atmospheric setting, the tension and mood are at a peak throughout the book and will keep readers on their toes until the final chapter. With so much at stake, this fast-paced read is one that you won't be able to put down. Lesley Thomson delivers a captivating, complex and captivating read, which you won't be able to forget!

I love Lesley Thomson’s writing and was particularly happy to find out more about “Mermaids” Toni and Freddy in this standalone murder mystery featuring the two popular characters from Thomson’s earlier book Death of a Mermaid.

Red herrings abound in this whodunnit and the eponymous Companion is definitely a bad ‘un. But is he a serial killer?

I also love books in which the author (a crime writer, obviously) includes a character who is a crime writer. Barbara Major and her professional stalking of random other people who might make good characters in novels made me laugh out loud.

Finally, I really enjoyed the burgeoning romance between Freddy and Martha. It felt just the right amount of side plot and just the right level of hearts and flowers for caring, down-to-Earth Freddy. I also liked the way Thomson highlights early on the contrast between Freddy, who wants a relationship, and her best friend Toni, who is happy being single.

Too often, I think, female DIs in murder stories are given convoluted love lives as subplots, and it’s great to have Toni who is all about the job and her platonic friendships. The happily single woman should feature more in fiction - after all, I’ve been happily single myself for stretches of my own life and I have some very happily longterm single friends.

Freddy Power and DI Toni Kemp return to solve a series of brutal murders in this book. An old manor house, now divided into apartments, is central to the case, and its many, really unlikeable residents. There is also an unsolved hit-and-run that occurred outside the house years earlier.

Freddy becomes involved with the residents with her weekly fish deliveries, and she gets to know a retired lawyer reasonably well, though wonders why the man would hire a live-in assistant (who is seriously questionable).

Lesley Thomson builds lots of tension through character dialogue (nearly everyone in the house makes barbed or just downright nasty statements to each other), and it's a wonder they're not all slaughtering each other! Also, with each new murder, the pressure builds for DI Kemp to solve things, and her friendship with Freddy suffers somewhat as a result.

I liked this, though I was a little confused at the start as Thomson introduces the many characters. But once that's over, the pace picks up, and I was reading avidly to the somewhat surprising end.

I should mention that I've yet to read book one, but will be picking that up sometime, based on my reaction to this book.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Head of Zeus for this ARC in exchange for my review.

⭐⭐

I wanted to like this one more than I did. I found it super slow. There were a million (slight exaggeration) of characters to keep track of. I found it difficult to keep everyone straight. Especially with all the jumping around from one POV to another. Last, it was just way too long!

**ARC Via NetGalley**

This is the second in a series, of which the first book is, 'Death of a Mermaid.' I didn't initially realise this was a second book and so backtracked to read the first in the series first. This works as a stand-alone, but I am pleased that I did go back, as I understood the relationship between D.I. Toni Kemp and Freddy Power better.

After events in the first book, Freddy has stayed in her childhood home, where she is still running the mobile fish service. She also takes an elderly man, retired QC Rex Lomax, to mass. She met Rex on her round, where he lives in Blacklock House, a former stately home, now divided into flats. Freddy is lonely and is happy to take Rex, so is a little put out when he informs her that he has asked for a Companion, from a company called, 'Cuckoo's Nest,' which matches the elderly, with a spare room, with young people who can provide company and help with tasks, such as driving or cooking, for somewhere to live.

The companion is Timothy Mew, a young man with grandiose ideas and his friend, hairdresser Martha Merry, is, like Freddy, a little put out to be losing him. Timothy settles happily into a setting he feels is his due, but Freddy is suspicious of his motives. There are a spate of murders locally, involving the deaths of a father and son, then of a whole family, in a lovely picnic area near Blacklock House. Toni is investigating the killings and her attention is drawn to the cast of characters who live within the walls of Blacklock House.

Author Lesley Thomson has cleverly re-invented the country house mystery and made it modern and relevant. I loved the eccentric residents, most, or all of whom, are not what they seem. It is obvious that Thomson is having fun with this. A deluded crime researcher, with a cat called Rendell, is one such in-joke, but she also creates real tension, especially with the relationship between the rather creepy companion and the elderly resident, Rex. Loved every word and it has made me want to investigate the rest of Lesley Thomson's back catalogue.

I love Lesley's work, The Detective's daughter and her standalone titles. I was really pleased to see that The Companion continues the story of Freddie. Thoroughly readable, a hint of menace and characters you believe in and want to survive!

A country house murder mystery in the classic golden age style, a lot of nods to the master Agatha Christie.

I personally was not grabbed at all by this book!

The story started off so slow and never ever really got going anywhere where it could have, sadly.
There were a lot of characters - too many for my liking and to be able to keep proper track of, not losing the joy in reading.
As for the plot, the investigation itself, it seemed to loop around a lot and was not satisfying at all!
Sadly, not a book for me!

Thank you, NetGalley for the ARC!

Interesting ‘country house murder mystery” with a golden age vibe but brought neatly up to date. I both enjoyed and was left a bit underwhelmed by The Companion - there’s a good air of mystery, a great set of possible suspects, but the end reveal was a little disappointing. In some ways it’s rather meta as there are references earlier to life not being like the books and films in terms of there always being a neat motive.:: and I would have liked a “I’ve brought you all here together” moment rather than what we get to wrap things up.

A solid read

Thanks to Head of Zeus/Netgalley for an advance copy of this book.

I enjoyed this book, but it took a little getting in to. There are lots of characters who appear thick and fast at the beginning of the story, so it took a while to get them set up in my head each time I continued reading.

All the characters are fleshed out greatly as we go along, there are no cardboard cut-out people in this story of a serial killer at loose in a coastal town.

Tonally, I'm not quite sure if I 'got' it. The book features the slaughter of families, but feels a little 'cozy' at the same time, like Midsomer Murders meets Luther, which didn't quite gel for me.

I liked all the characters, even those who turn out to be not quite what you thought they were.

Quite an engaging story then, wrapped up at the end quite neatly, although the killer's motivations are a bit *shrugs*.

In the Acknowledgments, Lesley Thomson writes that she loves to curl up with a country-house murder mystery and so, following her own advice to her creative writing students that they write the book they’d like to read themselves, she decided to write her own version of a country-house murder mystery.

The book features a diverse cast of characters to whom the reader is introduced in short order, much in the manner of the beginning of an Agatha Christie novel such as Death on the Nile or Murder on the Orient Express. Christie fans will take pleasure in spotting a few subtle references to her novels, such as the choice of Blacklock as the name of the mansion around which much of the action centres. There are also the tried and tested elements of a classic crime novel such as a gathering of all the suspects towards the end of the book (in the library, no less). Given Elly Griffiths’ cover quote describing the book as ‘like the best of Barbara Vine and Agatha Christie’, I also loved that one of the characters (whose first name is Barbara) has a cat named Rendell.

The police procedural elements of the book are very much of the here and now, as are some of the social issues explored in the book: the proliferation of social media, loneliness, drug dependency and the targeting of the elderly and vulnerable. You didn’t get characters in an Agatha Christie novel posting selfies on Facebook or possessing a burner phone!

When it comes to crafting the plot of a murder mystery the author knows her stuff, laying false trails, slipping in red herrings and generally leading readers up the garden path so that, like me, you’ll probably have suspected just about everyone of being the culprit by the end of the book – even Molly the owl. I wasn’t completely sure a killer who includes children amongst their victims quite fitted with the kind of crime you associate with an Agatha Christie novel, but then of course we’re in the present day, not the 1920s and 1930s.

The Companion is a neat homage to the classic country-house murder mystery but brought bang up to date.

This is a story that begins with a terrible crime a father and son are found dead after a day trip and D I Toni Kemp is called into investigate this is the second book that has featured Toni but I had no problem reading as a standalone story.

Timothy Mew has a new job as the companion of Rex Lomax, a resident of Blacklock House, which was once a stateley home and now converted into apartments. Rex’s wife was killed in a car crash and Rex has Parkinson’s Disease. We are also introduced to Freddy who is delivering fish at Blacklock House and is a friend of Toni’s and of Rex.

This is well written and detailed crime story which is best enjoyed slowly where you can immerse yourself in the narrative. There are lots of characters, including a peacock called King Tut in this story and it did take me a little while to get to know them all.

The residents of the flats think that they know everything about everyone or do they ? It definitely kept me guessing and that is always a huge plus for me in a book. Entertaining and full of detail.

4 stars ****

After reading "Death of a Mermaid" two years ago, I was delighted to have the opportunity to revisit some of the characters from that novel. The setting is a seaside town in Sussex called Newhaven. Blacklock House was very well described and I could imagine the atmosphere it would have evoked.

Despite its charming facade, Blacklock House is not a place I would like to live. The neighbors were an eclectic group ranging from the desperate to the odious. The only one I rather liked was Rex Lomax and I wondered why he didn't get rid of the new companion after week one. The companion, 33 year old Timothy Mew was a self-important, unscrupulous, snob, with absolutely no basis to be so. It is clear that the only reason he applied for the job of companion was so that he could reside at a stately home - where he felt he belonged.

I found this book to be rather character heavy. It took me some time to discern all the various residents of Blacklock House. I would have preferred that more emphasis be placed on Freddie, and on the police investigation led by Toni Kemp.

This book had an Agatha Christie type vibe and felt a tad contrived. The mystery element of the book was well plotted and it had me guessing 'whodunit' until the end. And yes, I was surprised.

With themes of loneliness, status seeking, extortion, and duplicitous behavior, this novel has a lot to offer the reader.

3.5 stars rounded up

If you love a good old fashioned English murder mystery, then you need to pick up The Companion by Lesley Thomson. This is the first novel by Lesley that I’ve read, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. There’s a real sense of mystery and I loved how Lesley put the spotlight on various characters, I was never able to guess who the killer was.

The novel opens with a shocking murder when a family are murdered during a day out as well as a father and son. This creates a sinister tone right from the beginning as DI Toni Kemp and his team grapple with the case and attempt to bring the perpetrator to justice before they kill again. What would give anyone a reason to want to kill these people? The crimes are so shocking, and I could see just how terrifying it was for the residents, fearing that at any moment the killer could strike again. I was rooting for the police to catch the killer.

The novel shifts its focus to an old manor house, converted into apartments. It is also the home of Rex, who is seventy years of age. Rex has just employed Timothy Mew, who is twenty-five years old to be a live in companion, following the death of Rex’s wife five years earlier. It is around the time that Timothy arrives that the murders start. The manor house falls under the spotlight of the police’s investigation, and it is clear to see that there are more than a few strange happenings going on in the former mansion. This adds to the chilling atmosphere of the novel, and I could feel danger lurking around every corner.

I liked how Lesley Thomson kept me guessing about her characters and I liked trying to work out what their real motives are. Is it too much of a coincidence that Timothy arrived at around the same time the murders take place? The character’s individual personalities come through so well on the page, really making you think about them. There are so many mysteries surrounding them which kept me utterly gripped as I was reading. I think this would make an excellent television drama.

The Companion is a highly addictive read and I was drawn into the mystery from the first page. I thought this was a highly entertaining read. It’s the type of book that you can lose an afternoon to. I really enjoyed it. The Companion is the perfect murder mystery novel.

This is the first book I’ve read by the author and I’d heard great things about it so was thrilled to be part of the tour.

If you know me, you know I love a good whodunit and the promise of one centred around the residents of an old country house, Blacklock, was very intriguing!

I instantly fell in love with Lesley’s no-nonsense and witty dialogue. The character of DI Toni Kemp has been brilliantly crafted and, for me, really anchored the novel with her observations and manner of expressions.

Add to this the unpleasant and dastardly characters residing in Blacklock and a wickedly clever plot, you have a very entertaining and compelling murder mystery.

I loved everything about this book. A definite nod to one of my favourite authors, Agatha Christie, and hints of the brilliant Knives Out movie. I could have continued reading this for another 364 pages!

I’d love to read a sequel as I was so intrigued by Blacklock House!

A man and his young son are the victims of a grisly double stabbing while out flying a kite on the beach. There appears to be no motive for their deaths, making it very hard for DI Toni Kemp and her Sussex police team to track down the perpetrator.

When another unsuspecting family become the next victims of the serial killer, found dead after a picnic on Deadman's Heath, DI Kemp's attention is drawn to Blacklock House, a former grand mansion that has been converted into flats. Now housing a small group of residents who seem to have plenty to hide, including the slightly peculiar twenty-five-year old Timothy Mew who has just taken on the job of companion to retired QC Rex Lomax.

Can DI Kemp get to the bottom of this perplexing case before the murderer strikes again?

The Companion is a literary crime thriller that begins with a shocking double murder and evolves into a left-of-field country house mystery, with all the sinister vibes you could possibly want.

The story starts with a grisly bang, and explodes into a number of intermingled threads around the lives of various local characters, gradually spreading to include the eccentric gaggle of residents at the creepy Blacklock House. There are essentially two sides to the tale, splitting between the personal relationships of the characters and the murder plot at hand, which are connected through a bevy of subplots.

A lot of characters come at you very quickly, and I did find it tricky to navigate through them at first, as there are so many aspects of their personal stories that link everything together. However, you soon get into the rhythm of where Lesley Thomson is going with this, and get a handle on how they all fit into the intricately wrought plotlines that need to be hammered out before the truth becomes clear, and it provides her with a wealth of red herrings to mix things up nicely.

What really draws you in is Blacklock House itself and the odd collection of residents that live there, ranging from the endearingly batty to the out-and-out menacing, and I can see that Thomson has had a field day coming up with all their perverse traits. Their encounters spill out into tense, and often blistering, verbal encounters that are darkly entertaining to read. If ever there was a cast of suspicious characters under one eerie roof then this lot fit the bill perfectly - and they definitely keep you guessing about their involvement in the macabre goings on in the neighbourhood.

My favourite character in this book was Freddy, and I loved her friendship with DI Kemp, who has some very quirky traits of her own it seems. I really enjoyed how Freddy ties many threads of the story together, and some of the most humorous parts of the book stem from her role in the tale - the heart warming ones too.

I think it's fair to say that this is a book that you need to give your full attention to, but if you fancy a cleverly conceived crime story that combines a touch of Elly Griffiths by way of a literary Knives Out, then this is an intriguing choice for your reading pile. It has some interesting observations on loneliness to ponder too.

Another fantastic novel from Lesley Thomson – whose writing just keeps getting better and better!

When James Ritchie took his son, Wilbur, out for the day he expected to have fun flying a kite; he didn’t think they would be the latest murder victims. DI Toni Kemp and her team have the task of finding out what happened and why. Everything seems to lead to Blacklock House, a grand country mansion converted into flats with seven residents, none of whom seem to be very forthcoming. When the bodies start mounting up, DI Kemp has her work cut out for her.

The one thing guaranteed with this author’s novels is that they are never cut and dried. She creates the most amazing characters, wraps them up with fabulous dialogue into a seemingly unfathomable tale and thoroughly bamboozles her readers! There is a wonderful cast of characters in The Companion; I began by taking them all at face value and ended up trusting none of them. I would have said I suspected everyone at some point or another but, when I reconsidered, I realised that I never actually suspected the guilty of having ‘done the deed’! Skilfully crafted, beautifully written and another of this author’s novels which I am delighted to highly recommend and, of course, give all five sparkling stars.

My thanks to the publisher for my copy and to Sophie Ransom for my spot on this tour which I’m delighted to help kick-off today; this is – as always – my honest, original and unbiased review.