#BlogTour: The Last Widow by Karin Slaughter @SlaughterKarin @fictionpubteam #TheLastWidow #WillTrentSeries

I am so unbelievably excited to be on the blog tour for Karin Slaughter’s newest Will Trent series instalment that is The Last Widow! Thanks to the Harper Fiction for the invite, as well as a copy of the book to read and review, I’m a HUGE fan and I squealed like a school girl when it landed on my doormat!

For those of you who don’t know (tut!) The Last Widow is Karin’s ninth book in the Will Trent series after a three year writing hiatus but it was so worth the wait, I promise! Don’t worry, you no longer had to wait, the hardback was published on the 13th of June. This means that you can treat yourself to a copy now from Waterstones or your preferred bookstore.

Karin Slaughter is one of the world’s most popular and acclaimed storytellers. Published in 120 countries with more than 35 million copies sold across the globe, her 19 novels include the Grant County and Will Trent books, as well as the Edgar-nominated Cop Town and the instant Sunday Times bestselling novels Pretty Girls, The Good Daughter and Pieces of Her. Slaughter is the founder of the Save the Libraries project―a nonprofit organization established to support libraries and library programming. A native of Georgia, Karin Slaughter lives in Atlanta. Her standalone novels Pieces of Her, The Good Daughter and Cop Town are in development for film and television.

‘It begins with an abduction. The routine of a family shopping trip is shattered when Michelle Spivey is snatched as she leaves the mall with her young daughter. The police search for her, her partner pleads for her release, but in the end…they find nothing. It’s as if she disappeared into thin air.
A month later, on a sleepy Sunday afternoon, medical examiner Sara Linton is at lunch with her boyfriend Will Trent, an agent with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. But the serenity of the summer’s day is broken by the wail of sirens.
Sara and Will are trained to help in an emergency. Their jobs – their vocations – mean that they run towards a crisis, not away from it. But on this one terrible day that instinct betrays them both. Within hours the situation has spiralled out of control; Sara is taken prisoner; Will is forced undercover. And the fallout will lead them into the Appalachian mountains, to the terrible truth about what really happened to Michelle, and to a remote compound where a radical group has murder in mind…‘

Well, I have enjoyed the Will Trent series for many years and I can honestly say that I didn’t think that the instalments could blow my mind as much as the last…. I was incorrect and I relish in that fact. The Last Widow is one of the darkest thrillers that I’ve read and I enjoyed every glorious chapter. Let’s start from the beginning!

Sara Linton and Will Trent is to the crime thriller world, as Ant and Dec are to Britain’s Got Talent. A huge number, if not all of thriller fans will know one or both of these literary heroes and reading the next instalment of the Will Trent series was like coming home…. in a twisted way! From the beginning of The Last Widow we are reintroduced to these characters on a lazy Sunday afternoon, when Will and Sara are at her parents house. The enjoyment of domestic bliss is short lived when they find themselves swept into an explosive sequence of events that engulf them in a life or death race of survival. The storyline shatters into multiple view points (mainly that of Will and Sara), while they are separate, they also entwine in a cleverly written and assertive manner. The web of details and narratives will keep you hooked until the very last page, thinking long after you’ve finished and leave you with some food for thought.

The use of multi-narratives allowed more details to be provided, as well as a broader visualisation of chronological events. For example, Sara’s POV would then be directly carried on by Will’s during the same event. As well as for the purpose of the storyline, the way the dialogue was written showed the depth of Will and Sara’s connection… told you that it was clever! Although there are various characters and point of views involved, the events that occur are both simultaneous, as well as chronological – but the chapters are also given days and times, to help with any confusion, although I didn’t have any, it was a welcomed touch.

Sara Linton, I felt was the more dominant character in this book, which I absolutely loved! Where most female characters are created to be weak and unintelligent, I love that Karin has created an outstandingly intelligent, logical kick ass female protagonist. Will Trent is an equally intelligent, somewhat broken man but equally as lovable, his partnership with Sara, both romantically and professionally gives me butterflies. Like I said, an iconic crime thriller duo.

I knew that I was going to love The Last Widow from the prologue, which is when a mother is kidnapped by a group of unknown individuals. I was so prepared to get sucked down the rabbit hole, because let’s face it, it’s all or nothing with Karin Slaughter. Every single chapter, I sat there, glued to my seat as I was delivered unpredictable cliff-hangers and gaspingly jaw dropping revelations – I’m quite surprised my heart didn’t give out from the constant racing tension and danger injected into the narratives.

The Last Widow has an attention grabbing plotline, as well as being scary due to the intense plausibility of the events and ‘bad guys’. It shows the evil of the world that many of us turn our heads away from in a way of denial. It is broken down into three parts, as  I read the last third and felt the nipping of chills at my nerves as the deadly spun concept worked its way under my skin. You can tell the extent to which Karin Slaughter has delved to research a number of subjects, including crime statistics, police procedures and the dark motives of radical groups.

The Last Widow had it all; captivating writing, intriguing perfectly paced storyline, characters with depth, good and evil ‘guys’, flawless  execution and thought infiltrating concepts. I could gush about this novel all day, but it may become incoherent, with a lots of hand explanations!

Highly recommend this read to adrenaline readers of crime thriller fiction, go and treat yourself to a copy, make sure to report back!

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Thank-you again to Harper Fiction for having me on-board this tour and for the beautiful hardback copy of The Last Widow.

Karin Slaughter fans, what Will Trent novel is your favourite? Let me know! Make sure to follow the #TheLastWidow blog tour!