Title: Fatal Mistake
My
Rating:🌟🌟🌟1/2
Book Description:
Detective Lexie Rogers is tough, smart and at the top of her
game. She's seen it all, from bikies, blood and betrayal to drugs, deviants and
deception ... and the violent knife attack that almost killed her as a young
cop on the beat.
Lexie's sent on the job of a lifetime -- to go deep undercover, as beautiful Lara Wild, a drug distributor, to expose a huge dealing ring among Sydney's most treacherous criminals. What she discovers is that being undercover is the safest place to be, especially when you're a cop with target on your head, but one false move means she'll die. And creeping from the shadows is the darkness of her past, something she can never outrun.
Lexie knows she can't trust anyone -- but the trouble is, she's not even sure if she can trust herself.
Lexie's sent on the job of a lifetime -- to go deep undercover, as beautiful Lara Wild, a drug distributor, to expose a huge dealing ring among Sydney's most treacherous criminals. What she discovers is that being undercover is the safest place to be, especially when you're a cop with target on your head, but one false move means she'll die. And creeping from the shadows is the darkness of her past, something she can never outrun.
Lexie knows she can't trust anyone -- but the trouble is, she's not even sure if she can trust herself.
My musings:
I was initially a bit hesitant to pick up Fatal Mistake when
I found out it was the third book in a series, but am happy to say that this
didn’t affect my reading pleasure or understanding of the characters or the
story at all. Whilst there are many established dynamics between the detectives,
they were portrayed in a way that I could quickly pick up the necessary
background information. The author’s intimate knowledge of police procedures
and dynamics within a team really stood out, which made the interactions
between colleagues look authentic and believable. I was fascinated by the
details concerning the dark seedy underbelly of crime and corruption in the
city, and the undercover operation to bust an established drug ring. Scary
stuff!
Fatal Mistake is a police procedural that centres around
various different colleagues from a branch of the NSW police targeting
organised crime, and is heavily character driven, which made for a nice change
from other books that focus on one particular case. Lexie Rogers is the type of
tough, feisty female character that really drives a storyline, and I thoroughly
enjoyed getting to know her. The undercover angle was a great way to showcase
the danger Lexie faced in her daily job, and the people she was up against:
bikies, drug dealers, hitmen, rapists and murderers. There were some scary
characters there! Readers who have read
the previous books in the series would have been familiar with Lexie’s
colleagues, who all seemed to have a rich history together – whilst I did not
have the background knowledge, I soon worked out the different dynamics and
enjoyed getting to know details of the various detectives’ lives.
Davis’ approach of showcasing different police operations
within the same storyline, and letting several characters tell their tale,
worked really well for me and added depth to the story. I loved how all the
threads came together at the end, and how the tension mounted before the
breath-taking finale. There were a couple of moments in the middle of the book
that dragged a little bit for me, and I didn’t care much for the character of
Berni , although I realise her POV was necessary to bring the story together in
the end. However, the pace really picked up in the last quarter and more than
made up for it. It’s great to read a police procedural set in Australia, in a
city I have visited and could visualise really well. I also loved the armchair
travel to Byron Bay, a place I love, even though this was a side of the town tourists
usually don’t get to see.
Summary:
Fatal Mistake is a fast-paced character driven Australian
police procedural with a feisty female lead protagonist, which gives a unique
insight into undercover operations fighting organised crime. Skilfully weaving
together several different threads, the tension ramps up to cumulate in a
breath-taking finale that left me stunned and slightly exhausted. Seeing that
this is the third book in the series, I will definitely need to pick up the
other two and find out what I have missed out on!
Thank
you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster Australia for the free electronic copy of this novel and
for giving me the opportunity to provide an honest review.
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