In 1986, Eddie and his friends Fat Gav, Hoppo, Metal Mickey and Nicky are on the verge of adolescence. They hang out together in their small town, deal with the bullying from Mickey’s older brother, and send each other coded messages in coloured chalk. Until one day, the chalk symbols lead them to a dismembered body and leave them with memories they can never forget. As they grow older, the gang slowly drifts apart, and an incident in college leads to a drastic break in their friendship. Fast forward to 2016 and Eddie is still living in the same small town as a teacher, when he receives an email from Mickey, wanting to reconnect about the dead body they found. Long-buried secrets are dredged up, and various bits of truth about that day are slowly unearthed.

The Chalk Man is a taut, atmospheric thriller that I devoured in a single sitting. Part of it was that I really wanted to find out what had happened that day in 1986, but more than that, I found myself drawn to the characters Tudor created, and to their lives. The story switches back and forth between the past and the present, and I love the juxtaposition that shows how much the characters have changed in the interim. The Chalk Man reminded me somewhat of Stranger Things, Riverdale, and maybe some of Stephen King’s books — the 1986 scenes had a similar sense of nostalgia and an idyllic environment tinged with foreboding.

Tudor does such a great job with the 1986 scenes that the 2016 scenes paled slightly in comparison. There’s still a sense of foreboding and the immediate mysterious threat of Eddie and all of his friends receiving a note in the mail with a stick figure sketched in chalk. One of the characters even gets murdered, which raises the question of who is after the gang now, and why they’re being targeted. But it lacks the sense of place and time that made the 1986 scenes so strong. It was also kinda sad to see how the lives of Eddie and his friends turned out in adulthood, though to Tudor’s credit, it felt all too real. And while part of me felt that the twists and reveals near the end were a bit much, it is also to Tudor’s credit that, looking back at the rest of the story, I realize that they fit right in with who the characters were and how they acted.

I finished this book late at night, and would highly recommend to start reading it earlier in the day. It’s a dark, creepy tale that’ll draw you deep into Eddie’s world, and definitely not the type of story you want to read in bed. The final chapter in particular is not the image you want to end the night with.

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Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for an advance reading copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When Dixie Wynn Braddock, a publicist for the San Francisco Thunder hockey team, meets Eli Casco, younger brother to the Thunder’s team captain Levi, in an elevator, sparks fly and they share a steamy kiss. Unfortunately, Dixie then learns that Eli may be drafted to be the Thunder’s new goalie, and the HR manual strictly forbids relationships between players and staff. While players are likely to get a slap on the wrist, staff will face immediate dismissal, and Dixie has worked too hard for her career to let that happen.

Slammed started off somewhat slow for me, and the cheesy flirtation between Dixie and Eli was far more eye-roll-inducing than adorable or hot. Eli charms Dixie with the utter lameness of his pickup lines, and she in turn counters with cheesy retorts of her own, and while both characters are well aware of the cheesiness and it’s all part of their flirtation style, I just wanted them to stop.

Dixie and Eli’s career challenges were much more compelling, and once they settle into some form of relationship that reduced the flirting, the story began to take off. I sympathized with Dixie’s desire to separate herself and her career from her older brother Jude, one of the Thunder’s star players, and with her skirmishes against a scheming co-worker. I also respected her hero worship of the rich and powerful woman who owned the team, though I thought that storyline’s resolution felt somewhat abrupt. Eli’s subplot was a lot more compelling — a serious neck injury in a college game has long-reaching psychological effects, and he freezes every time a scuffle between players gets too close to the net, which is a serious Achilles heel in a goalie. I like how Denault depicts his struggle to come to terms with this weakness, and work at overcoming it.

But the real star of this romance for me was the family dynamics. I love the banter between Jude and Dixie, and the fierce loyalty and emotional bonding between Levi and Eli. Jude and Levi were really compelling characters, and I love how perceptive they are when dealing with their younger siblings. There’s a great scene where, after a bad game, Levi tries to talk to Eli about his performance. Eli orders him to back off and Levi responds that he’ll back off as a brother, but there are things he needs to say as the team captain. Even as team captain however, his brotherly concern is still very evident, and I love how that relationship plays out.

I haven’t read the first book in this series, Score, about Jude and his girlfriend Zoey, who in Slammed is pregnant with their child. But I love Jude’s character so much I think I’ll give it a try, and hold out hope that Levi also gets his own romance someday.

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Thank you to Hachette Book Group for an e-galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When Noni’s infant niece is kidnapped by a gang led by the baby’s birth father, Noni goes online to track down her ex-boyfriend Denver Jones, a talented detective who Noni hopes can rescue her niece. What Noni doesn’t realize is that Denver is in hiding himself, from the evil doctor who genetically engineered Denver and his brothers to have superior intellect and strength, and that by posting their photos online, Noni has put herself in danger from the doctor and her henchman.

Twisted Truths is the final book in a series, and I would highly recommend reading the other books first. Zanetti does a fairly good job at reviewing the backstory, but as a new reader, it felt like an info dump, and it took me a while to warm up to the characters. In particular, the beginning of Noni and Denver’s romance happened in a previous book, so without that history, Noni’s desperate search for him felt a bit obsessive (why couldn’t she just hire another detective?). There were also multiple references to how different he’d presented himself to her previously, and without the context of just the version of Denver she had fallen in love with, I couldn’t understand how she could be just as much in love with such a drastically different man.

The suspense part was a bit easier to follow than the romance. The evil doctor wants Denver back to join her genetically engineered army, her henchman wants to kill Denver and his brothers for having killed his brother years ago, and Denver and his brothers want to kill them both. The doctor was a bit of a cartoon villain, which made it difficult to take her seriously, despite how dangerous Denver and his brothers said she was. At one point, she even giggles over having done the dastardly deed of writing on the heroine with black marker — I can understand the violation Noni must have felt, but that bit of villainy felt more like a high school bully than an evil mastermind.

Her henchman Sheriff Cobb was framed as an evil bully, but I actually felt a bit sympathetic towards him, because his motivation is revenge over his brother’s death in a fire set by Denver and his brothers when they were children. Again, this is a point where having read the earlier books would have helped by giving me a bit more context into Cobb’s villainy. As it was, when Denver taunts him by lying about how much pain Cobb’s brother was in as he died, Denver was the one I found cruel and for a moment, I almost wanted Cobb to win.

As the final book in the series, Twisted Truths brings back the characters from the previous books — Denver’s brothers and the women they love, and another group of genetically engineered brothers whom I believe where the heroes in another series by the same author. These characters come together to help Denver and Noni rescue the baby and end the evil doctor’s master plan. Once I got into the rhythm of the story and got to know the characters a bit better, the story picked up and the action scenes were fun to read. Denver also has to deal with some heavy emotional moments, and I like seeing his brothers coming together to support him. The ending is lovely and heartwarming, featuring somewhat of a family reunion and a promise of Denver and his brothers joining up with the other group of brothers and forming a much larger family. Given the horrific childhood they faced, and the struggle they went through to learn to accept familial love, this felt like a nice and fitting ending to the series.

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Thank you to Hachette Book Group Canada for an e-gallery in exchange for an honest review.