Lakshmi Priya Radhakrishnan's Blog
August 12, 2022
Book Review: Left to Die
Left to Die
My rating: 4/5
Author: Blake Pierce
Genre: Thriller
No of pages: 218 pages
Typical time to read: 4 hours 38 minutes
Book blurb:
FBI special agent Adele Sharp is a German-and-French raised American with triple citizenship—and an invaluable asset in bringing criminals to justice as they cross American and European borders.
When a serial killer case spanning three U.S. states goes cold, Adele returns to San Francisco and to the man she hopes to marry. But after a shocking twist, a new lead surfaces and Adele is dispatched to Paris, to lead an international manhunt.
Adele returns to the Europe of her childhood, where familiar Parisian streets, old friends from the DGSI and her estranged father reignite her dormant obsession with solving her own mother’s murder. All the while she must hunt down the diabolical killer, must enter the dark canals of his psychotic mind to know where he will strike next—and save the next victim before it’s too late.
My review:
Adele Sharp is a young FBI agent, on the trail of a serial killer that she hunts across the US. The killer’s victims have no connection at all except a pattern in the ages – the first victim was 29, then 28 and so on, with the last one being 25. Adele’s lead has run cold, and just when she thinks she needs a break and is looking forward to her wedding – there is a sad twist in the tale. And she is called back from her planned vacation because the killer has struck again with a 24 year old victim, this time in Paris. As Adele chases thin leads across France with rather unfriendly coworkers in this country, she relives a personal tragedy that has a link to the killer.
This is the first book in the Adele Sharp mystery series, and is so good that I immediately bought the next one, and cannot wait to start reading it.
The story starts with a rather personal setback for Adele that makes you readily want to empathize with her. The pace of storytelling is tight, with the killer’s actions are described carefully, with care and empathy, and you start rooting for the victims and keep hoping that they will be saved. The clues leading to the killer are cleverly thought out.
The best part of the story for me was the way Adele is described as handling very situation – with her mental and physical techniques so neatly explained that I wanted to learn and copy them myself. There is one questioning technique she uses on a powerful executive that simply had me floored.
What fell a little flat in the story were the character arcs of Adele’s father and one of her close friends; both felt slightly superficial. I also did not find the romantic tone at the end charming; it was a little dissatisfying. But this is eclipsed by the otherwise well written mystery.
Final verdict:
With an average reading time of about 4.5 hours, Left to die is a great Sunday read! It will have you rooting for Adele and is a very engaging thriller.
August 11, 2022
My debut novel
I became a fan of Sherlock Holmes in high school, and have ever since loved reading mystery, suspense and whodunits.
Silencing Trumpets is my first attempt at story writing. I wrote this story as a mystery novel 20 years ago, when I gave up my job because I was pregnant with my son, and my daughter was a toddler. I figured at that time that the children would need me, but I did have a lot of time on my hands and began writing this story. After that I forgot about it, and went right back to my job, until my son, a full twenty years later, discovered it in an old hard disk and decided to help me publish it. To think that this is a story written when he was a single cell, and he needed to grow into a young man for it to see the light of day!
It is now available on Amazon, and on the day that I made it free for the first time, it actually made it to #1 in the Indian Writing Category – for one day 
If you like mystery and crime fiction, do get your copy here: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0B7RJBVHF
