This was another thrilling read by Ms Jones. I'm going to be completely honest... For whatever reason this one didn't jump into my brain in the first few pages. I kept thinking maybe I wasn't in the right space for it so I put it in my pile to pick back up later. I know I have loved every LRJ book I've read so "it's not you, it's me" fit the bill. Boy am I glad I picked it up yesterday. I devoured every word and felt like I was CLINGING to that cliff at the end.

Lilah is a bonafide badass. I love that she is tough and has the mouth of a sailor, but her real character comes out when the cracks in her facade start to show. Kane is the perfect TDH (tall, dark and handsome) and comes with the extra Cartel edge. I love that the people inhabiting LRJ books often exist in a world of darkness either directly or on the fringe. As the book unfolds and Lilah realizes there are problems than even she hadn't anticipated, I happily followed her down the rabbit hole. I can't wait for book 2. Until then, still here clinging to the edge...

Can I have the next book in the series please? I am already hooked and dying for more. I loved that this book was different for me. It is not my normal read and that made it refreshing for me. It is more mystery than romance. It was intriguing and suspenseful and it left me questioning everything about the characters and the story. Did I mention that I can't wait for more? Yeah. You just need to go forth and read for yourself. Trust me you will not regret it.

Murder Notes (Lilah Love #1) by Lisa Renee Jones
4.5 stars!!!

“There’s a reason it’s usually someone you love who kills you.”


This is a step away from Lisa Renee Jones’s norm, this is a fully-fledged thriller that had me frantically turning pages while trying to connect dots in the vain hope of trying to fathom out what was going on…a true sign of a great one. There is a romantic undertone, don’t get me wrong, but at the moment, that is an undercurrent, the real meat of this book is a serial killer that seems to have a point to prove to our FBI woman, Lilah Love.

Lilah Love is an enigma, it is obvious she has a lot of baggage but her cold heart and ambivalence makes her hard to warm up to in the first instance. However, as the book progresses you begin to understand her and her mannerisms. Lilah is a total badass, she can more than handle herself and the way her mind works is fascinating. It takes a brave person to take her on and even braver to try and blackmail her with secrets she definitely doesn’t want uncovered.

“It bleeds because you bleed.”


The anticipation of her love connection, with Kane, is one that had my heart thrumming and this man is one hell of an enigma too. There is obviously a lot of history between these two and it is that and the ultimate chance of a second chance romance that definitely has me wanting more. But, is he all he seems? For me, I do believe he loves Lilah and has never stopped and despite his cool, calm demeanour, I am sure that Lilah is the only one that thaw and floor him. There is definitely a love/hate thing going on and for two people that were so close…what happened to separate them?

“…you don’t catch a killer by hiding from him. You catch him by getting to know him.”


The action in this book is what really keeps the pages turning and being a crime programme aficionado, this book was definitely right up my alley. A cross between Criminal Minds and CSI, this book has a touch of everything for us crime junkies and Lisa Renee Jones did an amazing job of keeping the suspense up, the reader captivated and that forever anticipation. I cannot wait for the next book in this series, it seriously cannot come quick enough.

www.theromancecover.com

A new LRJ series and in a genre I love??? What could be better??

Lilah Love is a sassy and smart profiler - which totally earns her points in my book. I love to read about FBI profiling. Add in some true crime and a bit of romance and this is the perfect book. Except I need MORE!!!

I love reading Lilah's thoughts and getting enough of the crime aspect to make my criminal justice heart so very happy. I can't wait for Murder Girl to come out!

BIANCA

Well, that was exciting!!
I really enjoyed reading it.
It's so completely different from other LRJ books.
It's a mystery thriller suspense thingy. Not a romance. Which sounds a bit bad for a romance lover like me - but don't worry - there are some shades of romance in here - and there might be more coming. ☺
I couldn't stop reading. I just had to know who and what and why and how and what will happen next??? And who can we trust and who is bad and who not and grrrrrr!?!?!
And I also wanted Lilah to find her happily ever after - but since it's not a romance, that might not happen ... yet. There are a few candidates though. ☺

We will also get a tiny little cliffy. The second book will be out in July. BUT - Lisa is really good with putting little summaries into the front of the second book in a series! Very good for people with #Bookalzheimers!

Anyway. I really enjoyed this story.
It was super exciting and suspensy and mysterious ... you just can't stop reading!
You want to hurry to the end of the book and catch the bad guy(s) with Lilah! ☺ And then we want to see everyone live happily ever after.

But the story is not only completely thrillerish. It's also the story of Lilah. A bit funny, a bit moving and a bit heartbreaking, a bit hopeless.... Lilah is a very complex character. She's really funny and sarcastic and ... kinda amazing and strong. But also very broken and hurt. And she's not really trying to heal from what happened. She also doesn't really give the men in her life a chance to fight for her. She's ... very ... complicated. That is definitely what Lilah's Facebook status would say. Not only her FB status - her life status! ☺ #Complicated

A few readers might even think the story was a bit complicated too. There are LOTS of names and people and suspects and family and ex partners and whatnot in this book. But surpisingly, I almost always knew who we were talking about ... that kinda never happens to me - I'm confused extremely easily! ☺

I also loved how Lisa described everything. I felt like I was right there with Lilah. I even tasted her chips and smelled Kane's cologne and felt the moist ocean air. Amazingly written. Some might even say that the detailing was a bit too much, but I really liked it!

Really great book. There's nothing more I could think of to say - there is lots I could say - but I don't want to spoil too much - you need to read it!!!

If you want to compare it to a TV Show, I would say it's a mix of Criminal Minds & Revenge!
I wouldn't mind seeing this on Netflix one day!!! I really need to see Kane!!

JANEANE
Murder Notes was a bit different from the previous LRJ books.

It did take me a little bit to get into this story, but once I was in it I couldn't put the book down.

Lilah Love's story is full of suspense, mystery and a little bit of heartache as well.

I was a little confuzzled at first, as we are introduced to so many people and departments, but it didn't take me long to get the gist of who's who in this zoo.

It is not just a murder mystery story, it is also to the story of Lilah, and all things interweave creating a web that will have you guessing right to the end... well, maybe not to the end of this part, as we do end on a bit of a cliffy.

I am hoping Lilah can find her way to a HEA trough all the murder and mayhem that surrounds her life **cough cough Kane cough cough**. She does come across a little abrupt and bristly at times, but then we see the softer side of her as well. She is a bit of an enigma really, and I am looking forward to where her story goes next.

Murder Notes is a story full of secrets, black spots and deception. You don't know who to trust, who is corrupt and who is truly has Lilah's back and that's just her family and former friends.

There is so much in play in Murder Notes that you aren't really sure which way to look, who to point the blame on. Lilah's ex lover is protective, but I don't know if that's a good thing with his cartel connections. Her dad is all about appearance and politics and something is just off there. The entire situation is a total cluster to be honest. You head is whipping in a million different directions, you are looking over your shoulder looking for people lurking in the shadows or are they hiding in plain site?

At this point we have more questions than answers and yes this is a cliffhanger and no... nothing was resolved. The story arc has been split into two books and I'm anxious to find out what will happen next. Find out who we can trust and who is trying to run Lilah back out of town and who is behind her having to back after she ran away all of those years ago.

All of that said I really enjoyed the plot of Murder Notes, but I found it very difficult to like Lilah. She is jaded and hard and cold. I can understand to a point why she is that way, but even the inner monologues didn't give me any insight that made her more likable to me. She tended to be a bit redundant and would go over the same things like she believed she needed to be hard and tough all of the time. Even though she is a profiler for the FBI, I would like to have seen a softer side, see her be more honest and vulnerable.

I will definitely be reading the next book, because frankly I'm really intrigued and I am dying to know what will happen next!

The Mistress of Mystery and Suspense does it again. Murder Notes was a nail-biter from start to finish. Special Agent Lilah Love was an incredibly strong, analytical and captivating character. Aside from a couple skeletons in her closet, Lilah Love is a very methodical, meticulous and skillful profiler with the FBI. Her loyalty is to the truth and she’ll go to any lengths to find it. She comes off a b!tchy or closed off...but seriously, she just doesn’t have time for BS, not even from her family. She pulls no punches and expects honesty. She’s straightforward and has a backbone of steel. She’s a pretty awesome badass. As she hunts for the serial killing that lead her back to her hometown, she begins to discover that the people she thought she knew weren’t whom she thought them to be. And it seems the only one she can really count on and come close to trusting is the big, bad wolf himself - Kane Mendez. As the story unfolds, I became more and more curious of Kane. That man is just as mysterious and enticing as the clues that Lilah uncovers during her investigation. He’s seems quite delectable and I can’t wait to see how his role plays out in all of this. I have yet to read a Mystery/Suspense from Lisa Renee Jones where I had any nails left. Seriously, she keeps me at the edge of my seat every time. Murder Notes was enthralling from beginning to end and left me wanting more. This is definitely a must read in my book.

Murder Notes by Lisa Renee Jones is the first book in the Lilah Love series. Lilah is an FBI profiler chasing a killer from California to her home town of the Hampton's. Lilah is not a very likable person, she cusses like a sailor and has a lot of issues. I love this book, and can not wait for book two. This book has non stop action, twists and turns that kept me hooked until the end. Unfortunately this books ends with a cliff hanger. Hurry up book 2. I love this books unique story line, and strongly recommend it.

I received this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I think I have a score to settle with LRJ. First of all ending the book at the point it ended is slightly okay (I just will be twiddling my thumbs to stumps before the next book), but the sneak pick of the next book absolutely slayed me. So, this book? It’s got suspense in spades. It is funny and deadly. The h, Lilah lives too much in her head though, but she is badass. What happened to her two years earlier was not clear cut to me. It was up to a point, but not in totality.. Kane will be an interesting hero. We have not even scratched the surface of this ‘dangerous’, but dishy guy. In summary this series will be one of the most interesting read for readers, if the suspense does not kill us. Please lets’ have more answers in the second book. Please.

Oh, by the way, the book is about a serial killer, or a copycat. The h is FBI, the H is son of a Mafia boss. They dated two years prior, something happened and the h moved away to another city. There was a murder, or, murders which reads like somebody knew about what happened and they want something. What? We don’t know. Or, Lilah’s life might be in danger.

This was an incredible intriguing and suspenseful read full of twists and turns all the way through. I cannot wait to read what happens next in the next book.

5 I'm on the Edge of my Seat Stars!!!

I began this year with a goal of reading more new to me authors along with a few debut authors and I've hit the jackpot in the last few weeks thanks in part to Ms. Jones. My book friends have been telling me for ages that I need to read her books and man were they right!!!

This book is a complete departure from the romances I've been reading lately and I LOVED EVERY SINGLE PAGE!! Talk about having a racing heart. This thriller had me wound up so tight I couldn't even think about putting the book down.

Lilah is a heroine that I immediately had mad respect for. She's a strong and independent woman but with some secrets that only one person knows about and Kane is a man that once he sets his sights on something doesn't back down. These two have a past together and it comes into play while Lilah is trying to solve the string of killings happening lately.

There's no straight line to the solving of this crime spree and yes we're left hanging at the end while I'm not a huge fan of cliffies, it's completely appropriate in this book because this story demands to be told right and I have a feeling we've just scratched the surface. I'm ready for the next one now please!!!

For the past year I've been reading romance so when I was giving the opportunity to read something a little suspenseful from Netgalley, I jumped at this. Most people know Lisa Renee Jones for her romance novels but in Murder Notes she gives us something new. At the begin of this story we get a glimpse of who Agent Lilah Love is, she's a profiler for FBI a tough, hardcore agent but with a past and secret she would not like to remember. But with every secret, something or someone has a way to bring it up. Lisa gives us murder, mystery, and suspense through the story with a number of suspects including Kane Mendez, aka Lilah former lover and the key to the past she would forget but needs. At first this story came off slow to me but with every murder mystery you've to build up the suspense. You will want to read Lilahs story.
*Received arc in return of my honest review from netgalley and publishers.

GREAT START TO A NEW SERIES!!!!!
ByAmy R.on April 3, 2018
This is not the usual romance/love story from Lisa, it's a murder mystery/thriller. It's well written with lots of twists, lies and secrets. Lilah Love is one of the best FBI profilers, who goes back to the Hampton's, where she grew up, when the victims have a personal connection to her and her past.Can she find the murderer without losing her sanity? this book was well written and highly addictive!! ONLY PROBLEM waiting for book 2 and ends with a cliffhanger.

When I start into a book I typically don’t expect anything to surprise me anymore. I have read it all, within my cute little romance genre bubble I live in and typical limit myself too, and nothing really pulls me out of my comfort zone anymore. I read a book and love it, but could never really tell you what truly made it unique and set it apart from the other 900 books I’ve read in the past 6 years. Well let me tell you, when I first had Murder Notes land on my kindle, I was apprehensive about jumping right in, knowing it’s out of my genre, but once I did I was so enthralled with this story I just don’t even know how to review it. First off, it’s some of Lisa’s best work. It’s so out of her normal genre she even writes, that I was pleasantly surprised how great it truly was. When you get into the mystery/suspense book type, it really must be very well thought out and planned. You can’t just throw anything together and make it work. Especially with this book and the start of this series, you can just feel Lisa did her homework on this type of story and it shows so brilliantly in her words!



In the first book of the Lilah Love series, Murder Notes, we get the story from our main characters POV. She is sent back to her home town to track down a killer. Lilah is an FBI Profiler and has avoided coming home at all costs. Until her investigation leads her right back to the beaches she’s tried so hard to avoid. When back in town she is also faced with her ex, Kane Mendez. He’s a crime boss and the farthest thing from what she wants or needs in her life. The pair share a past that unfolds within this story and as things start to unravel and more bodies end up in front of Lilah, she begins to question his involvement and her own personal connection to this case.



While we see little romance in this book, it’s there in a very minuscule way. The past begins to expose itself to us as the reader and the secrets you learn about her and Kane’s past do hold something over her. She begins to question it all and wonder if she’s going to be the killers’ next victim. The whole book is very much thoughts in her head vs. a lot of dialog, which as a speed reader was an adjustment for me, but once I learned the pace of Lisa’s writing in this book I feel right into a reading rhythm that was easy to breeze through. Bravo for this original and fun suspense that kept even the most dedicated of romance readers fully captivated!

Lisa Renee Jones has created a robust, interesting character with FBI Special Agent Lilah Love in her new romantic suspense, MURDER NOTES. Told in first person through the eyes and experiences of Lilah, Jones presents an intimate glimpse into the psyche of catching a serial assassin. This story is much more suspense than romance.

Lilah’s known as Murder Girl by her colleagues … a moniker she doesn’t like, but one that perfectly describes her. She’s tenacious and focused, and a psychological force to be reckoned with. Her investigation takes her from Los Angeles back to the East Coast to the Hamptons where she grew up. Back to the place where she’s not just Agent Love, she’s the sister of the current chief of police and the daughter of East Hampton’s mayor (and former police chief) — who is currently planning his bid for governor of New York. And where people remember her dead mother fondly as a beloved Hollywood actress. Lilah is no stranger to the quirky innerworkings of the Hamptons. Like Biggie lamented, “More money, more problems.” And let me tell you, these rich people have trouble in spades. Growing up in the fishbowl of a small, nosy, judgmental community, everybody knows everybody else’s business, and whispers of Lilah’s return to investigate a murder precede her everywhere. Not everybody is happy to see her … particularly her father.

More importantly (and most interestingly), it takes her back to Kane Mendez.

MURDER NOTES alludes both to Lilah’s own propensity for taking notes on the murder, in the form of index cards, and threatening notes that are being left for her in common places at inopportune times. Notes with little jibes like, “I KNOW,” that force her to keep her guard up at all times. With every encounter of people from her past — whether family, friend or adversary — Lilah adds one more index card to the white board of possibility.

Even more than Lilah, I enjoyed the character of Kane, the son of a New York crime lord who was once her lover and who, after years (and a whopper of a secret) apart, still very much holds a torch for her. Despite the urging of many of her colleagues, and the very questionable life he leads, she knows without a doubt that Kane is not the assassin.

There’s a saying that you can never go home. But for some people, I guess, you can never leave. Who we are is as ingrained as what we are. And Lilah is a woman with deep ties to a man who isn’t a textbook good guy, but is clearly not a bad guy either. Guilt and anger over their shared secret runs deep in her veins, and as much as she would like to purge it and her love for Kane from her soul, her soul seems to still be drawn to his.

I normally stay away from first-person narrative, because I don’t like the intimacy and one-sidedness of knowing only what’s in a single character’s head. I really, really want to know what Kane thought, and why he insists on keeping his pining for Lilah secret. I want to know why he so willingly — at least on the surface — threw himself on the sword of his father’s empire so she could be free to live her life. I want to know if he still loves her like I think he does and if he’s going to go after her. But I think, mainly, I want validation that it’s OK for me to root for the bad guy. Reader, be prepared: There is a doozy of a cliffhanger in this first installment. I hate to wish away time, but I can’t wait for July.

*Originally published with USA Today's Happy Ever After: https://happyeverafter.usatoday.com/2018/03/28/dolly-r-sickles-recommended-romantic-suspense-murder-notes-lisa-renee-jones/.

4.5 stars
Murder Notes is a fast-paced, action-filled suspense / mystery / romance with a kick-ass heroine, and a lot of men who think they know better.

Cop movies are notorious for not presenting the realities of policing. Instead, they have a tendency to show a misfit loner or two solving cases that procedure would have prevented them from ever clearing and thus triumphing over ‘the system’. While the American police force has come increasingly under fire for the problems caused by rogue cops, that image of the heroic lone wolf has remained. It can be found in our movies, our television shows and in Murder Notes, the first book in a new series by author Lisa Renee Jones.

FBI Profiler Lilah Love (OMG, a porn-star name for an FBI agent? Help me!) is almost grateful for the phone call which gets her up at five in the morning. The idea of heading out in the early hours to deal with a corpse on the beach is oddly preferable to her warm bed. That’s because the night before, her current lover had been pushing to have “the conversation.” The talk where they would move their comfortable friends with benefits situation into relationship territory. Lilah really doesn’t want to go there. She’s dressed and out the door in minutes, informing her boy-toy on the way out that she doesn’t do more than casual sex.

Upon arrival at the murder scene, she snarks it up with a local detective who really doesn’t like the FBI interfering in ‘his’ crime scenes, and then takes a quick look at the dead guy on the sand. There is an eerie familiarity to the moment: a nude body, with a perfect shot to the head, left in a location of easy discovery. A similar figure had been discovered just two nights ago. Lilah’s boss, also at the scene, is thinking serial killer but Lilah herself is thinking assassin. The scene is too neat, the death too quick and dispassionate to be anything other than a professional just doing a job. But why leave the bodies out in the open where they can easily be found? Why create an obvious pattern?

Those questions are compounded in Lilah’s mind by the tattoo on the dead man’s arm. It’s a design she’s seen before, on a man who attacked her several years ago. She gives her supervisor a quick rundown of all information she has from her brief glance, including her memories of the tattoo. He mulls this over, adds it to some intelligence he has on a case in the Hamptons and determines that Lilah has to be on a plane out there right away. Since Lilah is from the Hamptons, this will be a trip home for her, although like relationships, going home is something she normally strenuously avoids. Given no choice in the matter, she heads straight to the airport and into a past she’d just as soon avoid.

There is a body waiting for her when she lands. She goes directly from picking up her luggage to a crime scene similar to the one she had just left behind, only this time, she is in a community filled by names and faces she knows. Her father, the current mayor but with ambitions to take his political career further. Her brother, the current police chief who is leery of some ‘feeb’ messing around in his territory. And Kane, the head of the local crime family and a man with whom she shares an intimate past. She’s fairly certain, given the timing of the latest corpse, that the killer has planned this little reunion. And she has a pretty good idea that actually, she does know why.

My struggles with Murder Notes began in chapter one. It isn’t just that the author has chosen to give her character a porn-star name, but that the character stuck with it. Most women would deal with their parent’s poor lack of judgement regarding nomenclature by switching to a middle name, initials or a nickname, but this character seems to relish the opportunity to use her name as an excuse to fight with those who have the audacity to react to it. She also treats her job with less respect than a clerk at a discount store gives theirs. She dresses casually, when the FBI is known for wearing suits. She gives an opinion after only a cursory glance at the crime scene. She gets snarky with a co-worker as opposed to trying to work with them. When she makes it to the airplane, she’s bitchy and degrading to the stewardess. She treats the man in her bed with the kind of flippant attitude that would get a hero roasted for his chauvinistic behavior.

All of this is bad enough, but when she does decide on a nickname, not for public use but as a private self-identifier, it’s ridiculous. Read that last word as though it were written in all caps, bold, with a ton of exclamation points. Ready for the big reveal? She goes with Murder Girl. Her reason: Death simply becomes me. In fact, some might say I’m so fucked up that I do death better than life. I found this an irritatingly stupid sentiment, mainly because ‘murder girl’ is nonsensical. When Eve Dallas, from the In Death series, calls herself a murder cop, it makes sense because Eve is a police officer who works homicide. Murder girl is a phrase that tells you nothing except, possibly, that the person has a macabre way of looking at life.

Murder Girl isn’t the only linguistic incident that gave me pause. I found myself bookmarking scene after scene where Lilah’s inner thoughts gave me conniptions. Moments like:

If I don’t find a way to really, truly disconnect myself from my personal feelings, my problems are going to have problems. And when your problems start to have problems, you’re either the good guy that just got killed or the bad guy who just got caught. Or Going out there is dangerous, I know this, but the bottom line here is that there are two types of people: the ones that hide in a closet, and the ones that go find the problem.

In spite of the fact that Lilah’s history should have schooled her in how many shades of gray there are in the world, she seems to do all her thinking in poorly worded black and white clichés.

I could get into the romance, the mystery or other aspects of the novel but most of my comments would be equally negative. Sometimes a book just doesn’t work for a reviewer, and Murder Notes was such a book for me. The prose borders on acceptable, but the plotting and difficult characterization made me long for it to end. If you’re a long-time fan of the author this might work for you but anyone else looking for a good suspense novel will definitely want to look elsewhere.

Exceptional!!!
So this big question is Serial Killer or Assassin?
Well I guess you're gunna have to read to find out.

Lisa Renee Jones has really pulled out all the stops with this book, its dark, full of suspense and will grab your attention immediately.

Lilah Love is a Criminal Profiler with the FBI, when she's sent back to her home town in the Hampton's to help solve a murder two years after leaving, she finds herself spiralling into the middle of a web of secrets and lies all pointing back to the past she thought was a long way behind her.

What an amazing start to this new series, I cant wait to get my hands on book 2.

If there's one thing that i'm constantly looking forward to, it's getting my hands on a new book written by Lisa Renee Jones. It's nothing like the dark romances that i gravitate towards, nor is it an erotic novel. What this author offers is a realistic suspense novel with the side of the law that you rarely see - the stress, the pressure, the different departments that you suspected was there but never really got to confirm - these books has it all. And i've rarely seen it from authors and you just know who has experience in it and who doesn't (no i'm not saying that those who don't are bad, only that the small details aren't there, that's all).

This is a new series by this author and like the many other series i've read from her, it drew me in right from the start. There has this underlying story that you think you know, that you've heard Lilah's story before Murder Notes, but your curiosity just keeps getting you to pay attention and to keep reading so that you can really pinpoint if you're right or not. There were so many elements that drew me in - the emotions, the history of Lilah's home town, the secrets, the love affair that shouldn't have been, the crushing chemistry that is hard to ignore, and the murders. So many elements that worked great together.

There was enough action to keep me invested in this book, to want to find out what'll happen to Lilah, if she'll end with Kane even with all the instructions to keep away from him, if she'll find the murderer and whether or not someone was there that day when she was attacked. So many things that happened, and yet, i can't say that i was mixed up, which is a big fear of mine, of not being able to follow the storyline because there is so much going on at the same time. But i can honestly say, that the way things happened was just well done.

I loved this first instalment in the Lilah Love series, and i can honestly say that i can't wait to find out what's to happen next. I just might have to go back and start reading the other books by this author in the mean time, just to tide me over until the book releases!

*ARC provided by Author in exchange for an honest review. Reviewed by Kathleen, The Small Girl from A small girl, her man and her books