Review - Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding
I received a free galley from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Speak of the Devil is a thriller that hooks you from the very first page. On New Year’s Eve, seven women find themselves in a room with a dead man—or part of him, at least. All of them have a motive for his murder, but each of them denies committing the crime.
This story follows these seven women, as well as the detective in charge of discovering the killer. The reader sees these women in the aftermath of the murder, as well as in flashbacks of their experiences with the victim. We discover motives right along with Nova, the detective, and the case becomes increasingly complex. It becomes clear that Jamie (our murder victim) was abusive throughout his life, so the stories of these women cover decades.
This is a story about a horrible, manipulative man, and the women he betrayed and destroyed. It’s also a story about how society disregards abuse victims and abusers often get more chances than they should.
This book kept me interested until the end, though the solution to the mystery felt rushed at the very end of the book. I liked the characters and thought they were well-written and complex. I also enjoyed how motives were unveiled one by one and flashbacks are interwoven with the days following the murder.
Trigger Warnings:
Sensitive readers should know this book contains sexual content, graphic violence, rape, mental illness, drug and alcohol abuse, forced outing, homophobia, and suicide.
