Title: From the Shadows

Author: G. R. Halliday

Genre: Crime/Thriller

Publisher: Point Blank

Publication Date: 2nd July 2026

Rating: 5/5

Cover:

Summary:

Seven days. Four deaths. One chance to catch a killer.

Sixteen-year-old Robert arrives home late. Without a word to his dad, he goes up to his bedroom. Robert is never seen alive again.

The discovery of a body on the coast of the Scottish Highlands plunges Detective Inspector Monica Kennedy into a murder investigation that won’t begin and end with one death.

Meanwhile, seventeen-year-old Nichol has been missing for seven days. His last message was to social worker Michael, who can’t quite shake the suspicion that something is terribly wrong.

As Monica is faced with catching a murderer who has been meticulously watching and waiting, Michael keeps searching for Nichol, desperate to find him before the killer claims another victim.

Review:

 I was immediately hooked by the premise of From the Shadows and the promise of plenty of darkness and atmosphere. Happily I can confirm it was just as excellent as I’d hoped and positively soaked in tension and foreboding from the very start. We follow DI Monica Kennedy, a detective in the Scottish highlands, as she investigates a possible serial killer. As a Scot myself, I absolutely loved the Scottish setting which is brought to life exquisitely in all its brooding and dramatic glory. As a setting, Scotland works particularly well for mysteries and crime stories, in part because whilst it is a truly beautiful country, it also has a wildness and harshness to it, especially in the less inhabited areas, which lends itself well to the genre. It certainly works perfectly for this story, and really added to the almost otherworldly and folkloric aspects of the narrative. I also liked Monica Kennedy as a lead character. She feels layered and not one note or cliched in any way. I feel like there’s a lot more to explore with her, and because of this, I very much look forward to future instalments of this series. From the Shadows is a tightly plotted, intelligent, dark, and genuinely unnerving read which will absolutely burrow under the skin of its reader, leaving a sinister feeling of unease behind. I highly recommend it, especially if you love a good strong dose of unsettling atmosphere in your crime fiction.

★★★★★

Thank you so much to Anne Cater of Random Things Blog Tours for inviting me on this tour and organising it. I kindly received a copy of the book from the publisher. My review is entirely my own honest opinion.

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