Review: Three Card Murder

Three Card Murder by J.L. Blackhurst
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

** WARNING ** Cliffhanger **

DI Tess Fox and Sarah Jacobs are half-sisters. They were brought up apart, but Tess met Sarah and her father, conman extraordinaire Frank Jacobs when she was in her late teens/early twenties. At first Tess and her new family get on well, but the tragic events of one night led her choose law enforcement over a life of crime.

Now, fifteen years later, Tess is given her first murder case to investigate and its a doozy. A man fell/jumped from the balcony of his flat, but when the police arrive at the scene his throat has been slashed. Yet no-one was seen entering or leaving his flat in the 24 hours before his death and there is no forensic evidence to suggest anyone else was ever there. A classic closed room mystery! Tess would be thrilled, but she recognises the victim's name - he was one of the men involved in the incident that night.

As the bodies pile up, all linked in some way to the events of that night the only evidence at each site points to Sarah, herself a talented con-artist. But the clues are so obvious they must be misdirection ... or does she want you to think that?

This was clever, and the killer's motivation for staging the murders the way they did is perfectly plausible, but when the book came abruptly to an end I was more puzzled than eager to find out what happened next. I don't think the reality lived up to the blurb TBH. But then I'm not very keen on films like Now You See Me so a book which relies heavily on the illusionists' trick of misdirection isn't really my thing.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

View all my reviews