Everyone Lies by A.D.Garrett (DI Kate Simms #1)

I’ve been introduced to Everyone Lies, the first book in the DI Kate Simms series through Goodreads, a friend just finished reading it and I saw her review on my feed. Her review was 4 stars, so I decided to check it out. At the time Amazon had it only in Kindle format, it was that new, however I bought it on the spot and read it.

And it blew me away.

Now the DI Kate Simms series by A.D.Garrett consists at the moment of one book only, called Everyone Lies. On Amazon, it is not even listed as part of a series. However, it’s just impossible for it not to become an awesome series involving Kate Simms, the police officer with a troubled past living in Manchester. And let me tell you, it will become an awesome series, one that people will hear about more often once it gets around through the mystery reading circles.

A.D. Garrett is actually a pseudonym of two people:  the prize-winning thriller author Margaret Murphy and Professor Dave Barclay, a well-known forensic expert as well as police adviser.

And now for the book review.

The truth is when I started the book, I didn’t much care for it – initially. It had to do with drug users and street girls dying from drug overdose. Having never taken drugs in my life, I was kind of shielded from this dark side of humanity, so I could never really relate. However, it took me about 50-60 or so pages to really get hooked in the story, and to realize that it was so much more than that.

The more I read, the more interested I became, and I finally ended up reading the whole novel in two sittings (finished the book last night at 2 am in bed reading it on my iPad).

As you read along, you will see layers upon layers unfolding and what you think you know, you actually don’t. And people that should be friends are actually enemies, deceivers, and liars.

Kate Simms had career troubles in the past as she helped Professor Nick Fennimore and bent the rules in the process. Following that she suffered severe career consequences from which she was still recovering to date. Today she is working data, literally crunching it, and while doing so she spots a few anomalies, which bring her to ask Nick Fennimore for help. Nick owes her big for her sacrifice a few years back, for which he never even thanked her, so he agrees to lend a hand.

So here they are both again working together on a case which comes dangerously close to Nick’s past involving his wife’s death and his daughter’s abduction. He’s been searching for her ever since.

I won’t give away the plot, but let me tell you, the story from here on just gets more heated and more action-packed and more suspenseful.

As for the character development, I wish Kate were a bit more fleshed out, her feelings, emotions, her inner world a bit more expanded upon. After reading the book I felt that I knew Nick Fennimore way better than I did Kate. She is married, has two kids, but that angle is not very well pursued. Does she really love her husband, or not so much? It is not very clear from the book. It is clear, however, that Nick has very strong feelings for her – but how real are her feelings for him, and are they existing at all?

Also, there is Josh, Nick’s strange student, that even Kate is a bit weary of. He sounds very intriguing and I’m sure he has a past well worth exploring. I do believe (and hope) that all these characters will be further developed as more books will be written in the DI Kate Simms series, which considering how well the first book was received, it will become a huge success.