ShortBookandScribes #BookReview – Gallows Wood by Louisa Scarr
Gallows Wood by Louisa Scarr is published by Canelo Crime and is out now in paperback and eBook. My thanks to the publishers for the proof copy.
I’ve been in something of a reading slump this month and this was the perfect book to get me out of it. Louisa used to write as Louisa de Lange and I reviewed her first book The Dream Wife back in 2018. Then in 2019 I reviewed the first in her DS Kate Munro series, Ask Me No Questions (it looks like this series is about to be republished by Canelo). Louisa also writes the Major Crimes series as Sam Holland (The Echo Man, The Twenty and The Puppet Master).
The signs are unmistakable. The dog halts, his nose up – nostrils quivering. Every inch of him is poised. Moss has a scent.
When a hand is found in Gallows Wood, PC Lucy Halliday and her specialist search dog Moss must find the rest of the body. What they uncover is a killer’s dumping ground. Like every case since her husband’s mysterious disappearance, Lucy wonders if this one will bring her closer to the truth. Nico was a journalist with a reputation for getting buried in his work; Lucy is certain that this time he delved too deep.
With new DI Jack Ellis calling the shots, Lucy struggles to keep her professionalism intact. She can’t stay away from these murders – and a killer who may hold the answers she desperately wants. But with those at the very heart of the investigation withholding secrets of their own, can more brutal deaths be prevented?
The first book in the gripping new police procedural series featuring dog handler PC Lucy Halliday. Perfect for fans of Lynda La Plante, Val McDermid and Susie Steiner.
PC Lucy Halliday is a police dog handler. Along with her spaniel, Moss, she is tasked at the beginning of Gallows Wood to locate the body that fits the hand that has just been found. That is Moss’s speciality as he is a recovery dog. Before this came a prologue that did exactly what I want a prologue to do: it excited me, it got me thinking about what led up to the events in it, and it made me want to read the rest of the book.
Lucy has had a troubled few years. Her husband, Nico, has been missing for a long time and her professional life has gone to pot. Her work as a dog handler is what keeps her going and she’s about to find herself in the thick of it with new DI on the scene, Jack Ellis.
Gallows Wood is the start of a new series to feature Halliday and Ellis and I’m so pleased about it! I thought it was an absolutely superb book, a story with a conclusion but with enough to take it forward, both in terms of character and plot. I particularly liked the dog handling element which I haven’t come across in crime fiction before, and I loved the bond between dog and handler.
This book is made up of brilliant writing, a spellbinding plot, and fascinating multi-layered characters that I want to know more about. There are already two plot points that could feature in future books (I believe at least two more instalments are planned) and I can’t wait to see how Louisa Scarr develops them. Gallows Wood is for anyone who likes police procedurals and/or Line of Duty, or even for those who just enjoy a rollicking good read. I thought it was fantastic.
Louisa Scarr studied psychology at the University of Southampton and has lived in and around the city ever since. She is a full time writer, and when she’s not at her desk she can be found pounding the streets in running shoes or swimming in muddy lakes.
She is the author of the Butler and West crime series, published by Canelo Crime, beginning with Last Place You Look and ending with Out of the Ashes. A new series, about a police dog handler, launched in July 2024 with Gallows Wood.
She also writes as Sam Holland and is the author of the award-winning Major Crimes series, following detectives as they investigate murders committed by brutal serial killers in the south of England. This began in 2022 with The Echo Man; the latest, The Puppet Master, is out now.
She began her career writing as Louisa de Lange: her debut novel The Dream Wife was an eBook bestseller and hailed as ‘startling and clever’ by R&J bestseller Cara Hunter, and ‘thriller-writing at its best’ by the Daily Mail. This was followed by the Kate Munro series, Ask Me No Questions and Nowhere to be Found.
You can follow her on Twitter @paperclipgirl and on Instagram @louisascarrwriter.
