Reviewed by Lit Amri for Readers' Favorite

Seventeen-year-old Elizabeth Gray was an enigma to everyone that knew her. When she was found dead, hanging from a tree, it shocked everyone. The case becomes more mysterious when the police find out that she had no birth records. Mack Mackenzie, Lillian Harris, and Vanessa Davis are Elizabeth’s childhood playmates, who didn’t keep in touch with each other as they have their own circles of friends. Yet, they were the ones closest to Elizabeth before, and she is reaching out to them once more from beyond the grave, asking for help. United once again, the teens investigate and find The Brambles, a derelict mansion owned by the hermit Mitch Cooper. The place has the answer they’re looking for, but they are putting themselves at risk, especially when the place is run by a defrocked priest named John Leary.

The Brambles by Leah Erickson is a potent combination of mystery, crime, and the paranormal with a well thought out plot. As the story moves forward, Elizabeth’s past is revealed bit by bit, providing answers but also leading to different kinds of questions. It heightens one’s curiosity and the story is highly intriguing. The complex characters filled their roles perfectly with their facades, flaws, and secrets. I gravitated more towards the young protagonists. Mack, Lillian, and Vanessa－including the dead Elizabeth－have more maturity that they don’t show to other people. At the same time, they are still unsure about themselves, about life, and struggle with their own personal and family issues. Investigating Elizabeth’s death almost wrecks them but shapes them as individuals as well. Erickson’s writing style has a subtle mythical flair that makes the narrative extremely engaging. Fast-paced and deftly written, The Brambles is a riveting read.

Reviewed by Viga Boland for Readers' Favorite

It’s a real treat to find a legal mystery fiction that you can get into quickly and enjoy the unfolding plot without getting lost in a copious amount of lawyer jargon as happens to too many legal thrillers. Teresa Burrell, author of The Advocate’s Homicide, is a lawyer, but her focus isn’t on impressing readers with her knowledge: it’s on telling an absorbing story based on a too common and very sad social issue: paedophilia. Burrell wants her readers to understand the devastating long term effects of sexual abuse, in this case on young boys. Can it lead them to abuse others? Can it even make them murder their abusers? And how does working with abused adolescents like those in The Advocate’s Homicides affect the therapists and the children’s lawyers. And could an abused child be convicted of murder even when the evidence doesn’t really add up?

Readers will get thoroughly caught up in the plight of a drug addict’s son whom lawyer Sabre O. Brown refuses to believe has murdered and partially buried his abuser. Like Sabre, we don’t believe he’s guilty. Then, when more bodies show up and their murders are similar to this one, Sabre and her associates decide there’s a lot more to these homicides than abused children taking revenge. Readers will be kept guessing who the real perp is almost to the end as the team exhausts itself investigating every possible suspect and scenario. The strength of Teresa Burrell’s writing lies in her marvellous use of dialogue to keep the story moving. When it comes to descriptions and facts, she keeps it short and on a need to know basis only. This makes reading The Advocate’s Homicide so enjoyable and so quick, but never with a lack of believable characters who chatter amicably, tease each other and joke around, like real people do. The Advocate’s Homicide is a wonderful blend of good and bad and will most likely have readers unfamiliar with Teresa Burrell looking at the other books in this series. I certainly intend to check them out.