Bleeding Heart Yard: Breathtaking new thriller from Ruth Galloway's author

Product Information

MY THOUGHTS: Bleeding Heart Yard - what an evocative title! It refers to a courtyard in Holborn, London, where Lady Elizabeth Hatton was murdered in the seventeenth century. I’ve been loving this series so much! Harbinder Kaur is such a fantastic character. It’s been great seeing her out of the comfort of her hometown and her parent’s wings. She’ One day her husband persuades her to go to a school reunion and another ex-pupil, Garfield Rice, is found dead, supposedly from a drug overdose. As Garfield was an eminent MP and the investigation is high profile, it's headed by Cassie's new boss, DI Harbinder Kaur. The trouble is, Cassie can't shake the feeling that one of her old friends has killed again. Manor Park’s graduating class of ‘98 was quite distinguished. “The group” as they were known in school included seven members.

This multiple point-of-view mystery was deeply engrossing, with Harbinder’s rather more ironic voice neatly balancing out the narratives of both Cassie and another former Manor Park student, Anna. While Cassie is tense with the expectation of discovery, Anna is genuinely surprised to learn that Garfield’s death might have something to do with their classmate’s over two decades prior, especially after further conversations with her friends, who challenge her own recollection of events. The fungibility of memory is an important theme in this novel, as our main characters reflect on the stark contrast between what they’ve always believed and what they learn, over the course of the book, to be true. Cassie who was in attendance has secured the guests in the library, but after overhearing a private conversation, she is afraid that one of the group has killed again to make sure that what they did to David Moore remains a secret from the past, so she tries to steer her new boss away from those at the reunion, suggesting an alternate motive instead. I am a massive lover of crime and thriller stories; it is one of my top (if not THE top) genres. The description of the plot sounded fantastic and I was very much looking forward to it... however my expectations were unfortunately not lived up to.This is the third installment in this series with DI Harbinder Kaur. In this one, she’s made the big move to London and is finally away from her parents. I found that she really grew in this one personally, which made for good character development. The plot is excellent, there’s a lot going on with several subplots and the golden gang are good characters adding plenty of colour as we have two MPs, a famous actress and a well-known musician which means there’s never a dull moment. The fast paced plot builds well, there’s plenty of tension and your suspicion antennae twitches in several directions. The ending is one of those never saw it coming scenarios and I do so like a finale like that! I love how Harbinder becomes ‘Susie’ to her team at the end - you’ve arrived girl!!

When Cassie Fitzgerald was at school in the late 90s, she and her friends killed a fellow student. Almost twenty years later, Cassie is a happily married mother who loves her job—as a police officer. She closely guards the secret she has all but erased from her memory. Then we find out that twenty one years earlier David Moore, another student was murdered. Was it an accident or something more sinister? In the present Harbinder Kaur has been promoted to DI in the CID of the MET and is in charge of the MIT at West Kensington. Apologies for all the acronyms but I’m sure they are pretty self explanatory. Cassie is now DS Cassie Fitzherbert. She has a husband and two children. Cassie attends a reunion at her alma mater, Manor Park school. Everyone in her friendship group will be thereAnd finally there is the casual dismissal of all Tories as venal lying bastards. Many of them are, but the same is true of many politicians more generally. If we are going to have an un-written assumption that the left is always right, climate change is an unavoidable catastrophe and other woke positions are unassailable, then I am afraid this author will become a no-go area. DS Cassie Fitzherbert has a secret - but it's one she's deleted from her memory. In the 1990s when she was at school, she and her friends killed a fellow pupil. Thirty years later, Cassie is happily married and loves her job as a police officer. I’m not sure how I feel about DI Hardbinder, she seems quite insecure for the head of a team involving a high profile case. I did not enjoy this book quite as much as the previous two. It didn’t quite have the same sense of drama, in fact the case itself seemed to go around in circles a lot. The ending was, however, a very surprising twist. I enjoyed reading this one but I didn’t love it. Many thanks to Netgalley and Quercus books for the much appreciated arc which I reviewed voluntarily and honestly. That being said, I did enjoy reading some of the characters. I enjoyed the relationship between Anna and Chris, and particularly had a soft spot for Star. Izzy was irritating, but I felt that added to her overall character of her being the successful actress. I also really appreciated the use of a real life location for the setting of the murder as it connected it to the real world.

years before, the woman now known as Detective Sergeant Cassie Fitzherbert believes she was at least partially responsible for the death of David Moore, a fellow pupil at Manor High School, a day before they were due to receive their A-Level results. Then, when Cassie attends a school reunion party, another of her former classmates, controversial right-wing MP Garfield Rice is also murdered. Is Cassie right, or was Garfield murdered by one of his political cronies? It's in Cassie's interest to skew the investigation so that it looks like it has nothing to do with Manor Park and she seems to be succeeding. I’m fairly sure that the defunct Imperial underground station doesn’t exist though, as I rode that tube line for six years so surely would’ve noticed. I don't know if it's the difference between listening to audio books as I do with the RGs, or reading as I did with this but I just don't find the characters convincing, plus there's just the main one so far and not the hinterland of RG.She killed fellow student David Moore, 21 years ago, and got away with it, as she will tell you in the prologue. And, ALL of “the group” was complicit in the crime. Due to the new London setting, and since Harbinder is the only character in this (apart from a brief appearance by her parents) who featured in this one, Bleeding Heart Yard could easily be read as a standalone. It was a pleasure to read this thrilling novel, and has me so excited for the next in the series. Harbinder has moved to West London following her promotion to DI, and her first case with a new team involves the death of a prominent Tory politician at a school reunion. Her suspects include the man’s former friends, all part of a popular clique known as The Group, one of whom just happens to be Cassie, Harbinder’s DS - who has been keeping a terrible secret for twenty years… This was the class reunion for a posh school, Manor Park Comprehensive; this class has a lot of high profile graduates!! There are also several errors, such as here in ch. 1: "... the tree outside Harbinder's window is turnng from green to amber to red, like a traffic light in reverse". That IS the sequence ! In reverse it would be red, red and amber and then green. The error is repeated at the start of ch. 25.