Mother Love

DI Sarah Quinn #2

by Maureen Carter

Olivia is resigned to dying. It's only a question of when, and she almost welcomes the instant of oblivion when she’d no longer have to suffer the taunts, the menacing whispers, the veiled threats in her candlelit prison: ‘Why should I kill you? Death is so . . . final. We have all the time in the world . . .’

Schoolteacher Olivia Kent hasn’t been seen for five days.

Then a horrifying note arrives at the police: “Olivia Kent is lying. Olivia Kent is crying. Olivia Kent is dying. I could make it quicker. Put her out of her misery. But I won’t.”

Time is running out and Detective Sarah Quinn needs all the help she can get. This means working with Olivia’s best friend . . . who turns out to be muckraking journalist Caroline King.

She’s been Olivia’s best friend since they were six years old. Now she must put aside her differences with the Ice Queen if they have any hope of finding Olivia alive.

Genres: Crime, Mystery

242 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Former BBC Newsnight presenter Maureen has worked extensively in newspapers, radio and television. She still freelances in the business, when she's not busy novel writing. As a journalist she's worked closely with the police, covering countless crime stories, including several murders. She's also interviewed victims and seen villains sent down.

Maureen was inspired to write Working Girls by a police pilot scheme to treat younger prostitutes as victims rather than criminals.

"It set me thinking about women on the game," she says. "What made a girl risk her health, and her life, night after night? What, if any, choice did she have? I wondered: could I combine appealing characters from this largely ignored section of society with a measure of social comment and produce an engaging and entertaining crime novel?"

Reviews

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounded down.

There was absolutely nothing wrong with this book. It was a very competent police procedural but it just didn’t seem to have the sense of drama that I was looking for. I’ve been trying to clear my kindle of books that have been lurking there for ages and I read this over a few days in between arcs and other books, which probably didn’t help keeping the spark of tension going.

Olivia Kent has been missing for 5 days but nobody knew this until a note arrived at the police station:

“Olivia Kent is lying.
Olivia Kent is crying.
Olivia Kent is dying.
I could make it quicker.
Put her out of her misery.
But I won’t”

To be fair, someone had called the school she worked at and told them she was sick. So DI Sarah Quinn and her sidekick DC David Harries swing into action. There is not much to go on. And, much to Sarah’s annoyance, one of the potentially best sources of information about Olivia is her journalistic nemesis, Caroline King - Olivia’s best friend.

After a lot of scut work we finally get to the crux of things. It turns out that Olivia actually has been lying. There are things she hasn’t even told her best friend and the whole point of her torment is revenge for something terrible she did.

It was actually a really good story and I think it could have been better if injected with a bit more oomph.

[M. O'Gannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mother Love – A DI Sarah Quinn Mystery – Published 2011 - *** Di Sarah Quinn fights all the elements – her boss, her partner – the perp – her nemesis. A woman is kidnapped and tortured. Quinn is in charge of the investigation outside some micro managing by her boss. The book had too many red herrings without enough clue for the real culprit. Also the continuing cat fight between DI Quinn and reporter Caroline King got tiresome in the first book of the series and became way beyond tedious in this book. I learned to skim some of the dialogue between these two to move the book along. If a plot summary of another book in this series mentions the King character, I will not be reading it.

[Kay Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The second of the Sarah Quinn books that I've read. Sarah lacks the troubled past that Bev Morriss had, though there's still some murky history. Thankfully Maureen Carter hasn't changed her style with the change of characters giving the reader the same thrill of guessing the outcome, and of course, getting it wrong. The cracking pace kept up until the last chapter, and here I must admit I got a little lost. As this was the Kindle version I was reading, not for the first time there seemed to be an error in the download where the narrative seemed to jump. However, if there was a gap, it was one I could fill in as my own detection rate had actually moved faster than Sarah's. Once again I find myself asking why have the TV producers missed these gems from the pen (well keyboard) of Maureen Carter.

[Cidney · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the second of the Detective Inspector Sarah Quinn books. The plot for the first book was fine but I just didn't like Sarah Quinn, or in fact any of the police officers in the book. As I have bought the first 4 books I thought I had better get on and read them.

In this tale a young teacher Olivia Kent has gone missing, although no-one noticed that she had, until her mother after not hearing from her in a while rang Olivia's school to see if she could have a word. Presumably rang at a break time, the school office said oh but she, her mother, had phoned in to say that her daughter wasn't well and wouldn't be in that week, the last they had seen of her was the previous Friday, as this was now something like Wednesday her mum was worried. I would be too love. So mum rang the police and got the not particularly interesting Sarah Quinn and her sidekick an equally uninteresting man named David Harries. The battleaxe of a mother and the equally arrogant DI obviously wouldn't be getting on.

I think it's her mother who gives Quinn a note she had received which seems to imply that she has been abducted, Quinn finally opens a missing persons case. Gosh they are a slow police force in Birmingham, but that can't be true, they weren't when I lived there, perhaps they are understaffed now. To cut a very long story short Olivia is finally found but she won't speak to Quinn. Caroline King the reptilian news report naturally arrives on the scene as she happens to be Olivia's best friend, except she hadn't been invited to her wedding and neither did she know that she had had a baby girl in America who died at just a few weeks old.

Finally Quinn and co find the abductor and snakey person is sent for trial. I really can't get on with the police officers themselves in this book and Quinn, as the lead, is just so arrogant. I still have another two of these books to read. Better get cracking then. Sigh.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another good story and lots of drama and thankfully, this time, the analogies were kept to a minimum as I did find them rather distracting in the first book and seemed to be there to bulk out the words. Although I really enjoyed it, I felt that there was something missing at the end when we found out why and the background; it was almost as if it was implied but never said. So it left me feeling a little bewildered as to why it happened and to what extent did the main characters have in this? Otherwise it would have been 5 stars

[Tracey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mother Love

School teacher Olivia is missing and no one is aware she's gone. When the police receive a note about her disappearance Sarah Quinn is on the case.
This book is brilliant. Maureen Carter has tightened up the characters and written a novel that I couldn't stop reading.
Highly recommended.

[John Roberts · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book whivh had me gripped towards the end. I found the first half a little slow n streched out to much but a great ending. I will certainly read more in this series as I really like DI Quinn and her determination.

[Joyce tuffs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good read.

The second book in the Sarah Quinn series. This was a good story but not as good as the first.

[Debbie lost in a world of books. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Again I find myself hooked.

[christine arlott-clay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oooh, kidnap, and mystery

Gripped from beginning to end. Perfect balance of character s , humour, sarcasm lol, and twists to keep you hooked. My kinda book

[Mr Kenneth L Mullen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another good book

Another good story by Maureen Carter.Interesting characters and a plot that had me somewhat confused in the early stages. An interesting ending.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zipped through this one. Very well-paced plot with good chapter lengths.

[S D Lawrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent story.

[Monica · Rating 3 out of 5]

Carter writes strong female characters - Sarah Quinn the cop and reporter Caroline King are well matched allies/antagonists. The Birmingham cop scene is well portrayed with some well done characters. The kidnapping of schoolteacher Olivia has some interesting twists. But I still like the Bev Morriss series better.

[Sherri K · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to push through this book. it was not interesting at first, though it was just interesting enough to want to know who done it and it got much better about 60% of the way through.

[Trish Feeney · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just discovered Maureen Carter and am enjoying working my way through the Sarah Quinn series.

[Michelle Eames · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hard work. Main cop is quite dull.
Perhaps I have read too many crime novels but I am sure I have read this before.

[Caroline Ingvaldsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second DI Sarah Quinn police procedural as surprisingly plotted as the first.

[Ann Tonks · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just couldn't be bothered finishing. Flat writing and characters.