For some time now I have noticed that the D.I. Kim Stone series has been highly praised by my fellow book bloggers. Therefore, I decided that despite my lengthy TBR, I would read the series in its entirety, one title every month. What a wise decision I made!

D.I. Kim Stone – An acerbic, brusque, and driven young woman who works as a Detective Inspector for the West Midlands Police, the second largest police force in the country. She is socially inept, and has been known to break the rules, as well as to disregard instructions and protocols in her search for justice. An insomniac, she is fueled by nervous energy and lots of coffee, and is beautiful, but she works hard to hide it. She is 34 years old, brilliant, hot-headed, and damaged. As a child, she suffered horribly, and was shunted from foster home to foster home. Only once did she experience a nurturing, loving relationship – and that was very short lived…. Now, when not working, her favourite thing to do is work at restoring vintage motorbikes. Bikes are her passion, and she uses a Kawasaki Ninja as her regular form of transport.

Other than her second in command, Bryant, she is friendless. Her one real weakness is her fondness for her adopted dog, Barney.

“No matter what the day held, Barney’s welcome was enough to put a smile on her face.”

Her team respect her and are very loyal. And no wonder – Kim never asks her team members to do anything that she would not do herself. In this outing, Kevin and Stacy frequently ask themselves “What would the boss do?” while trying to make crucial decisions.

Police team

D.S. Bryant, twelve years her senior, is Kim’s partner and dearest friend. Devoted to his wife and daughters, Bryant is the glue that holds Kim’s team together.
D.S. Kevin Dawson, young, vain, fit, and impulsive. Each book in the series shows his growing potential to be a great police officer. This time he is partnered with DC Stacy Wood.
Constable Stacy Wood, a diligent and hard-working local girl who excels at online research and data-mining which is often invaluable to the team’s success.
D.C.I. Woodward (Woody) is Kim’s long-suffering superior. Like the rest of her team, he is loyal and stands up for her when the higher-ups would have her removed from the case.

In DI Kim Stone’s seventh outing we find her team working on a case of murdered prostitutes. The murders take place in the Hollytree housing estate. A place of criminal gangs, despair, and hopelessness run by the ruthless and heartless pimp, gang boss, and overall criminal, Kai Lord.

“Hollytree was the place you were sent if Hell was having a spring clean.”

Meanwhile, a male infant is left at the freezing cold police station parking lot. Kim discovers the child and tasks her team members Kevin Dawson and Stacy Wood to find out his identity and that of his mother.

After suffering a brutal attack in the last book, DC Stacy Wood is pleased that Kim trusts her enough to work out in the field. Little does she know that Kim and D.S. Kevin Dawson are worried about her and keeping a close eye on her.

This seventh novel in the series has proved to be a worthy successor to the first six.  The series just seems to go from strength to strength.

“Broken Bones” with themes of illegal immigrants, prostitution, money lending, extortion, and grooming and procurement of young woman for sex workers and/or sex slaves, the subject matter is gritty and might not be to everyone’s taste.

The only negative I can find with this series is that Kim is too dependable. She has fierce tenacity and determination to always see justice served. Not a bad thing, but at times almost unbelievable. That being said, I would want Kim and her team in my corner if I was a crime victim.

As I finished this seventh novel in the series, I felt certain that this entire series is one I will certainly recommend to all lovers of gritty crime fiction. Lucky for me I purchased the entire series in order that I might read one installment every month for my “Marsons of the Month” blog series. I look forward to reading the eighth book, “Dying Truth” in August. Oh, and in case you didn’t already guess… “Broken Bones” is highly recommended by me.

I purchased “Broken Bones“ in Kindle format.

Angela Marsons discovered her love of writing at Primary School. She wrote the stories that burned inside and then stored them safely in a desk drawer.
After much urging from her partner, she began to enter short story competitions in Writer’s News resulting in a win and three short listed entries. She self-published two of her earlier works before concentrating on her true passion – Crime.
After many, many submissions she signed an eight book deal with Bookouture as their first crime author. Her D.I. Kim Stone novels have sold 3 million copies.

Angela Marsons is from Brierley Hill in the West Midlands and is a former security guard at the Merry Hill Shopping Centre. She continues to live in the Black Country with her partner and their bouncy Labrador and potty-mouthed parrot.

Follow Angela Marsons on Twitter.