Police Detective David Cade lives just to work as a dive officer for police as he begins to find bodies of young girls he is just going through the motions until a new person is assigned to the unit because of so-called mistakes when she was with major crimes. Naomi gets to Dave and his police work when he begins to find more girls his own daughter goes missing, and suddenly a head inspector comes in looking over everyone's shoulder. A really good book with mystery and suspense.

This was a good story which kept me turning the pages throughout the night. Great mystery, writing and plotting will recommend to all my friends who love this genre.

This book has a palpable tension that keeps the pages turning…..simply brilliant… I had to finish this marvelous thriller in one sitting! Taut and incredibly suspenseful, every moment is perfectly crafted to keep me wanting more.

Thanks to Netgalley for a copy of this book for an honest review.

Diver David collects bodies from the Thames. DI Naomi is demoted following a tragic incident. Young girls bodies start turning up but something doesn't add up. What is the connection between them and the sudden disappearance of David's daughter. Lots of info about tides on the Thames and hidden connections. Recommend for fans of police procedural books.

DIVE by Jon Barton was an excellent book, especially as Jon was a new author to me and I love finding and reading from new authors, Dive was full of great twists and turns from start to finish and its a new police procedural book set in London's most dangerous crime scene — the River Thames. This features two main characters - Met DI Naomi Harding and Marine Police Sergeant David Cade.

Marine Police diver David Cade lives by a simple rule........Pull out the bodies from the Thames and move on. But, he is hiding a secret, every time he pulls a body out of the Thames, he fears its his estranged fifteen year old daughter Lex. Who has gone missing after they had a fierce argument and hasn't been in touch since.

Met DI Naomi Harding can't abide that. Her whole career, she's wanted to fight and a good fight. She was a high-flying Detective and recently thrown out of the CID. Now she working for the Marine Police. She has to buckle down and get on with it.

They both discover a dead girl, bloated and broken on the surface of the Thames. And then another.

All the dead girls have the same thing in common, they all have a nightclub stamp on the backs of their hands. This is the same one David's daughter Lex had the day she disappeared.

Then, a briefcase is discovered in the same stretch of water, and suddenly the higher-ups at CID, including Naomi's rival, Detective Chief Inspector Shannon Baines, start showing an interest.

Clearly something big is happening.

David and Naomi must work together if they're going to solve the dead girls' murders and find Lex. Then they uncover something that will threaten to blow the case apart

They have to tread very carefully and watch each others backs. as this could get them both killed.

WoW. This book is so good and I am looking forward to read more by this new author.

Big thank you to Netgalley and Joffe Books for an advance copy of Dive exchange for a review.

Sergeant David Cade, ex Royal Navy Marines and Military Police, now works as a diver in the Met’s Marine Policing Unit on the River Thames and prefers to lose himself in his work since his divorce and split from his family. DI Naomi Harding is under investigation and has been side-lined to the unit after a drugs bust went badly wrong and three officers were killed on her watch. Their job is simply to pull the bodies out of the water and pass them on but Naomi badly misses being a detective. On the Monday Cade is called to a blockage which turns out to be a suitcase of drugs, just like the deadly ones that surfaced in Naomi’s old case. Later that day Cade’s estranged fifteen-year-old daughter Alexis visits him at work and says she is in trouble. He never sees her again and lies to his ex-wife who is panicking about a club the girl was planning to visit. On the Tuesday a young woman is pulled from the water at Blackfriars and to Cade it looks like an overdose. Another similar girl is found the next day. But something’s not right. DCI Shannon Baines visits the unit and commandeers both the bodies and the drugs but when the cases are hidden from the system, Naomi wonders what exactly is going on and just who she can trust. She is determined to find out how and why the girls died and gets help from an unknown deep throat caller and also an old colleague, whilst Cade is running his own investigation into his missing daughter, leading him to a dodgy boyfriend and a nightclub that the two victims have visited. When they team up together, both may well be risking not only their careers but also their lives in their quest for the truth.
This was illuminating, although I did have to google a bit to get an idea of the layout of the Thames and the police marine unit, not knowing the area concerned at all. I had previously thought the frogmen were simply police who had an additional skill and donned a wetsuit when required, and had no idea it was a separate unit who go looking for bodies all the time and who also undertake no form of investigative work which seems a complete waste of police training. It’s a good thrilling story, a little slow to get off the ground but which really picks up speed when Cade and Naomi pair up, but I’m not convinced about the likelihood of having two lone wolves ending up together in the same small department, both ignoring orders and protocol and breaking the law into the bargain. I didn’t like the US terminology in places such as using the word “stoop” for porch and describing detectives in their office as “squaddies in the bullpen” which made me wonder where the author is based. The plot is revealed slowly which maintains the suspense and keeps the reader questioning the various characters’ motives right up to the end. A promising debut.

Through enjoyed this book one of the best thrillers I’ve read in a long time! It was a fast paced and kept me guessing throughout a perfect book for psychological thrillers fans alike! The ending wow and I did not see it coming!
Overall, I throughly enjoyed this book and all the plot twists that it presented! Jon Barton definitely should be on everyones shelf!

A different view of policing. The divers who work on the River Thames recovering the bodies usually just pick them up and pack them off, but a sudden influx of overdoses - when one of the divers' daughters could be involved changes that.

Really enjoyed it.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher I read a free advance review copy of the book. This review is voluntary, honest and my own opinion.

DIVE by Jon Barton.
A police diver whose obsession with the job has made his home life implode.
A high-flying detective recently thrown out of the CID.
A case that could get them both killed.
Really enjoyable read. Great story and characters. I do hope there is more to come. 5*.

Dive it's not one of those books that starts with a bang, it slowly build the scene and then you are hooked.
A gritty and dark story, gripping and well plotted.
I liked the characters and couldn't guess the twists. The final part is adrenaline fuelled.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this arc, all opinions are mine

Gritty writing for this one, no superfluous descriptions or information. Set in a police diving team for the Thames in London, it took a couple of chapters for the crimes to become apparent. But then it grabbed my attention and I could not put the book down. Told from different viewpoints, they only start to come together later in the book . You do come to get to know the main characters and I did come to like them as the book progressed.
The crimes seem believable and are interesting and there are a couple of twists along the way.
Thanks to Net Galley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Joffe Books for an advance copy of Dive, a police procedural featuring Met DI Naomi Harding and Marine Police Sergeant David Cade.

Naomi has been demoted to the Marine Police from CID after an operation she was leading went badly wrong. There she works with David Cade rescuing dead bodies from the Thames and passing then on. Recently they have been finding dead young women with the same nightclub stamp on their hand. Naomi wants justice for them, David dreads that one of them is his missing teenage daughter, Lex. When they rescue a briefcase suddenly the hierarchy and especially DCI Shannon Baines, is interested.

After a slow start I enjoyed Dive, which is an exciting read with a bit of a mysterious plot in that I found it difficult to discern some of the characters’ motives. It is told from various points of view, mostly Naomi and David with others contributing as and when necessary. These other contributions flesh out some details about events and motive, but throw up even more questions. It is obviously designed to keep the reader wanting more information and it worked for me.

The novel is more character driven than many in the category. Both Naomi and David carry a lot of baggage and have buried much of it in an obsession with their jobs. It can be heavy going at times trying to keep up with their thoughts, but it has an interesting take on why they both get involved in trying to find out what happened to the girls, safe to say that justice and altruism don’t figure.

As I said I found the novel slow to start. Yes, bodies are found but there is no real hook until later on when Naomi and David start working together. Instead it starts with scene setting and a lot of suspicion/mistrust that didn’t really appeal to me as I’m all about forward momentum. Once the partnership starts the novel gets interesting, tense and exciting in parts with all the forward momentum I could ask for.

Dive is a good read that I can recommend.

4.5 stars rounded up

Police diver David Cade lives by a simple rule: pull out the bodies and move on. Naomi can't abide that. Her whole career, she's wanted to fight the good fight. But circumstances have sent Naomi to the Marine Police. Then they discover a dead girl, bloated and broken on the surface of the Thames. And then another. Each time David pulls a body out the water, he fears it's his estranged fifteen-year-old daughter, Lex. she'd gone missing after they'd had a fierce argument and hasn't been in touch since. The dead girls all have the same nightclub stamp on the backs of their hands - the same one David's daughter had the day she disappeared.

This book has it all - complex characters, a missing daughter, flawed characters and a compelling storyline. I was pulled into this story from the first page. It's not always an easy read but it's so well written it makes you realise that being a police diver is an even tougher jog than you could ever imagine. I really liked David and Namoi who are strong characters. There are some individual threads to this story which are neatly tied up as the story progressed. The pace is perfectly set. I hope this is the start of a new series.

I would like to thank #NetGalley #JoffeBooks and the author #JonBarton for my ARC of #Dive in exchange for an honest review.

This is an excellent, well written and researched thriller by the author, and I really hope the start of a new crime series. The plotting is brilliant, based around the divers of the Marine Police unit and the difficult job they have to do. I loved David Cade and Naomi, the main characters, both strong and flawed but the characterisation is beautifully portrayed and the reader is drawn right into their emotions. Once I started reading, I was engaged and hooked to the end, drama, suspense and a superb ending means an easy 5* from me. I really recommend this book to lovers of thrillers and crime novels. One of my best reads this year! Thanks to Joffe Books and Net Galley for my ARC.

Police procedural coming from the retrieval of bodies by the Thames River Police so I though an interesting change. Yes, the diving aspects were indeed interesting as well as rather horrific, the police procedural less so. The two main characters have more baggage than Heathrow especially as they are not allowed to do any investigation once they have landed the remains. Frustrating for them. Frustrating and depressing for me as a reader. I never engaged enough with them, other than with their frustration. Still, if they can't investigate and they are the main characters there's not much other than their backgrounds to reveal. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy.

My primary care is mysteries, but this is the first time I have read a police procedural about police divers. I enjoyed the mystery and the intrigue, the only thing I had a tough time with was the non-primary custody divorced dad being apparently not interested in his daughter's life and problems, to the point of harshly turning his back on her for no apparent reason. Obviously the main character suffered from depression, but I didn't think that the reason for him turning away so blatantly and rudely, was fleshed out enough (which leads us to dislike the main character). Sure, he came around when he feared her dead, but that is just...cold.

Really though, one small point in an interesting and well written, complex mystery. Would read the author again, and many thanks to Netgalley for the eARC!

Brilliantly written novel … suspenseful, intriguing and unsettling story filled with police drama and fractured family relationships. Well-developed twists that keep you captivated and lead to a climatic ending. Well worthy of five stars.

Good book! This book had suspense, intrigue, action, murder, mystery, serial killer and a bit of a who done it, and great detective work! The storyline was very interesting and kept me glued to my Kindle! I did enjoy reading this book!! I will definitely recommend reading this book as it was well worth reading! Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for sharing this book with me!

marine-police, England, crime-fiction, suspense, thriller, police-diver, exmilitary, law-enforcement, rivalry, riveting, angst, family-drama, family-dynamics, depression, nightmares, psychological, procedural****

Police diver David Cade of the Thames River Police is a mess. His job is to bring up bodies from the muck of the polluted river and go no further with the investigation. And his daughter is missing.
The publisher's blurb is good, so there is no need to repeat it. This is a really good tale that brings out the toughest jobs in the police service and makes the people real. It's a difficult read, but very worth reading.
I requested and received an EARC from Joffe Books via NetGalley. Thank you!

Thank you NetGalley and Joffe Books for the eARC.
The fact that this book features diving in the Thames was of interest to me and those scenes were fascinating and quite creepy, but other than that I found it hard to feel anything for the two main characters. They both have a lot of baggage, mainly caused by their obsession for their jobs.
Young women are found dead in the Thames and drugs are involved, which I feel has been done over and over again and bored me. Overall, this book didn't do it for me. Sorry!