Intriguing storyline that veers this way and that, a puzzle of a mystery that unravels gradually, with an interesting narrative. I really enjoyed this accused and accusers weaving a tale in a world that things like this, actually happen to ordinary people where the unbelievable becomes reality. Thank you netgalley and publisher for preview.

I found that the blurb made me think this was a very different book than what it turned out to be, I was more interested in the perceived plot than the narrative itself

This is such a gripping read!

Seven women find a man's severed head sitting in the centre of the floor. Each of the women has a motive and reason for wanting him dead. Each one denies any involvement. They have to discover who the real killer is in order to protect each other. However, despite their best efforts, their darkest secrets start to unravel.

This is such an edge of your seat thriller, mystery read! I was HOOKED! Each character is so well written and interesting to see how these women try to work with each other. But also the impact of bad treatment from previous horrible men

Wow a book I could not put down kept me turning the pages late into the night.The characters the women come alive their stories their strength.Rose Wilding is an author I will be recommending following.#netgalley #johnmurraypress.

Seven women stand in shock in a seedy hotel room; a man's severed head sits in the centre of the floor. Each of the women - the wife, the teenager, the ex, the journalist, the colleague, the friend, and the woman who raised him - has a very good reason to have done it, yet each swears she did not. In order to protect each other, they must figure out who is responsible, all while staying one step ahead of the police.

4.5*

I really enjoyed reading this. I hadn't been quite sure what expect before starting, but it combined a murder mystery (with a twist), with a thoughtful approach to relationships, abuse, and power. The basic structure- one of these women killed this man, but who and why - is developed carefully through the range of narrators and flashbacks, showing the disturbing negative power the murdered man held over the women, as well as the magnetism and attraction that he used to get their attention in the first place.

What I found particularly effective as well was the way that the book made sure not to absolve the murder victim of his abhorrent behaviour, but also made sure not to simply place the women as victims. Instead the roles that sone played in bolstering his abuse, whether by willfully blinding themselves to his negative sides, by seeking his approval to the detriment of other women, or through their own neglectful and damaging treatment. The characters receive a three dimensional approach without resorting to oversimplifications, and the book left me thinking about it for a long time afterwards.

*Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the free ARC*

one of the issues with this book was that they were too many povs and at times I found it so difficult to remember who is who.

The ending had good aspects but I was bored if I’m honest, if I hadn’t been giving this arc I wouldn’t have continued reading and I was close to dnfing

Kaysha is a journalist, and ex-girlfriend of Nova, a police detective. Kaysha has been meeting with a group of women with links to Jamie, to try and get action taken against him. A meeting is called, and they find Jamie's decapitated head there.
Nova is investigating the crime, and gets to meet all the women and find out their stories, their relationship to each other, and all the terrible things that Jamie has done to them in the past. Any of the women could be suspects, so the story takes you down all the different possible roads, until Nova finds out who killed him, and why.
I liked Nova and Kaysha, but the other women weren't so engaging, and some of the plotlines (Sadia) didn't seem very plausible. I really enjoyed the teenage girls and their part in the plot.
Recommended.

Seven women stand around a severed head of a man and we follow their stories, their connections to the deceased and the detectives investigation to learn which of them was his murderer.
Speak of the Devil is an ambitious and original novel, an insightful commentary on the treatment of women by some men. I loved the premise and discovering how the women were connected to the vile, misogynistic manipulator Jamie. The weakness of the novel for me was that I felt that there were too many characters and I kept losing sight of the women and their stories. This meant the plot lost it's tightness and momentum for me. However it was still a compelling read that I'd recommend.
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this digital ARC.

A real page-turner of a novel. Very gripping and very dark, the plot unfurls in such an engaging way you just can't stop reading! The characters are built out really well and are very engrossing as you find out what these hateful man has done to each of them. A truly brilliant read!

What an incredible debut. Deliciously dark, twisty and utterly gripping. Each woman drawn so perfectly, she could have been sitting right next to you. A depiction of what it is to be a woman, and how powerful we can be together. A flawless tour de force.

I should've reviewed this earlier because I don't remember too much about the book anymore, but I do remember that I thought there were too many POVs which all sounded exactly the same. The plot also got a little too messy in the end.

Loved the different POV’s in this, especially Nova who wasn’t your usual detective. Loved the regional accents too, wasn’t overused but really immersed you in the setting. The central mystery is good and I still wanted to know who committed the murder even with such an unsympathetic and hateful victims.

Seven women are summoned to a seedy hotel room where they discover the severed head of Jamie, an odious man each has good reason to want dead. Is one of them responsible? The novel starts off with a bang and definitely held my interest. Each woman's story is told and had me emphasizing with them while also trying to figure out which of them was responsible. The ending made sense but felt a bit rushed.

Women Scorned…
Women scorned explored in this emotionally charged whodunnit. A severed head, seven women and a hotel room. Every single woman has just cause to have committed the act of murder - but did any of them do it? The clock begins to tick. With a deftly drawn and thoughtfully crafted cast of characters, an intriguing plot and a dark thread running through from the off this is an immersive and, perhaps, unpredictable tale.

Not gonna lie- this tale of ladies’ revenge gone wrong had me cackling! A fun new take on the time tested whodunnit trope- easy five stars

I felt a bit thrown in at the deep end with the beginning of this book.
Not so much the scene but ALL the characters.
It took me a while to get them sorted in my head.
Once I had, I enjoyed it more.
As theirs stories are told I came more and more to realise Jamie was a ****** (any rude word you like can go here) and he had negative impact on sll of them.
The ending came abruptly, and wasn't too much of a surprise.

A decent read

The book was sent to me via netgalley.co.uk pre-release for the purpose of reviewing, and these types of books can be hit or miss… but this was definitely a hit. It starts with a group of women who have gathered together at the behest of an unknown text message – to witness the disembodied head of a man they all knew. It starts good, and gets better. The prose is light and easy to follow, but covers some difficult subjects. The LGBTQ+ aspect of the book was a nice addition, and makes a nice change from the usual heteronormative relationships in moth other books.

This is essentially a whodunnit thriller, but so much better than most. I don't like books which describe themselves as "twisty" because that usually means they just left an important detail out of the story earlier. Luckily, this book doesn't (or didn't when I first read it), and while the clues were there, it would be difficult to predict how it ends.

Definitely recommended!

A great read that hooked me right from the start, Well written with a compelling storyline and well developed characters. There is so much going on with this book and I loved it, some parts had wuite slow pacing, whereas I would have preferred faster pacing but overall I loved it.

Everything about Speak of the Devil really enticed me - the cover, the title, and especially the blurb. I thought having the opening chapter start in amongst all of the chaos was a superb choice, but the following 50 pages were slow to get through. Whilst I appreciate that all of their backstories and experiences were important, having that many main characters made the whole thing confusing and difficult to keep up with who was who, and how they connected.

I liked that this book was set in the UK, and that I could recognise some of the places mentioned, which isn’t usually the case with a lot of popular crime novels. However, I thought some of the writing of the Newcastle accent was severely overdone. I have family members with this accent and could understand what was being said, but it felt gimmicky, and could be very offputting to any readers unfamiliar with the dialect.

That being said, it definitely had me hooked and kept me turning the pages. From the 30% mark to around 95%, I was thoroughly enjoying it, and hated Jamie with every fibre of my being. The themes explored really resonated with me as a woman, and the book felt very emotionally impactful. I thought Wilding’s writing style was very gripping, and could tell a lot of love went into this. The handling of the LGBTQ+ characters and themes were also handled particularly well.

I’m just really, really disappointed by the ending. Not so much the whodunnit, as it was fairly obvious from the fact this character was the least explored until the reveal, but the abrupt ending. It felt as though the only thing that mattered in this book was finding out who the killer was and not the women who it was actually about, and left so many things unanswered and unsatisfying. This was not an open, ambiguous ending for the reader to contemplate their own theories, it was lazy, and dampened what otherwise was a fantastic book.

Thank you to NetGalley and John Murray Press for an honest review. All opinions are my own.