Reviewed by Lesley

TITLE:  Murder in Shades of Wood and Stone

SERIES:  DS Charlie Rees Book 2

AUTHOR: Ripley Hayes

PUBLISHER: Self-Published

LENGTH: 269 pages

RELEASE DATE:  June 20,  2023

BLURB:

An early morning phone call. A dead teenager. A bunch of hostile witnesses with a wedding to attend.

Charlie Rees was enjoying the calm after the storm in Llanfair. He thought he and Tom Pennant might get some peaceful time together. Maybe even fall in love. Not a chance.

As Charlie battles to get justice for a murdered boy, Tom has his own battle to save the art college and his career.

This is book two of the Charlie Rees trilogy. The books are best read in order.

REVIEW:

This is the second book in the DS Charlie Rees series and sees us back in Llanfair to continue the developing relationship between DS Charlie Rees (the police detective) and Professor Tom Pennant the grudging principle of the local art college.

This story carries on the investigations from the first book (Murder in Shades of Blue and Green). There are also new murders to investigate, car thefts to solve, and banners being hung from impossible places. Can our team of four from Llanfair police station solve them all?

Tom is still dealing with the fall out of the “extra payments” for foreign student places and unsolved murder from book one at the art college. How is the college going to refund the payments back to the parents who are demanding them? Staff are concerned about the extra workload from being a lecturer down. Will Llanfair Art College and Tom as its principle survive the unrest and uncertainty?

Ripley Hayes nicely weaves the continuing investigation from the first book in with the new crimes being investigated in this book. I especially liked how Ripley showed Charlie’s frustration with not being able to focus on the most recent murders of two young men.

I really enjoyed the story development in this book, but it didn’t knock my socks off in the same way as the first one did. I think that is because this book focuses more on Tom & Charlie’s relationship than the first one did. Don’t get me wrong the crimes do get plenty of focus but this much more of MM romance than the previous book was which was definitely more of a police procedural. I personally liked that it was detective story where the main focus wasn’t Charlie’s sexuality. There are still plenty of twists and turns in this book to keep you guessing and I found the unfolding investigation gripping. I also really enjoyed that we got to see the unsolved crimes from the first book progress in this one. I really wasn’t expecting that.

The relationship storyline between Tom and Charlie was well written and you want them to overcome life’s curveballs. Maybe they will get some peace in the next book Murder in Shades of Red?

RATING:

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