Interesting started with a murder from the past not reading the first it took me a couple chapters to get into it and understand it. I wasn't thrilled reading it and didn't enjoy it.

Secrets is a mystery that has a great beginning that will grab your attention but kind of falls a little flat at the end. The letters were a sticking point for me. They should not have been at the end of the book, but sooner in it. Still a good story,bit not one that I would run out and buy.

As gritty as the small town streets where it's set, Secrets by Mary Russell grabs you early on and doesn't let go. As fine as a Mystery as you'll come across.

I was a tad disappointed with this book. I could not connect with the characters. Miranda, is a researcher and I wish the details of how she dug information pertaining to the investigation was mentioned in the story. Lee was not very likable either. He doesn't seem to take a no for an answer. He tries really hard to woo Miranda and though she rejects him, he gets jealous when her male friends visit her. This is not something that I would like to see in the main character of a story.

The dialogues - conversation between the characters - seems dull and sometimes, out of context. Like, Miranda is talking about the snow and in the next sentence, she starts talking about the investigation. Throughout the story, I found many such instances where the character is either commenting on the weather or the surrounding and then suddenly starts talking about the ongoing investigation.

Miranda and Lee seem to get phone calls from people who knew something about the murder. The duo believes them all. A little bit of investigation and details of how they(Miranda and Lee) found the information to be true or false would have made the story interesting.

Finally, I wish the letters were included as and when mentioned in the story rather than at the end of the book. Including them in the story as and when mentioned would have given the story an interesting touch.

Overall, there is a lot of potential for this story albeit the dull conversation and investigative skills of the characters. The concept was pretty good but this was not my kinda story.

Secrets, written by Mary A Russell is an interesting mystery novel and is currently a Kindle Unlimited selection on Amazon. When Lee is fired from his long time job, he does some soul searching about his mistakes with his wife, Joan, who had passed away. While he is pondering what he is going to do with his life, he receives a request from his wife's best friend, Miranda.... a former FBI agent. Surprising himself as much as anyone, Lee decides to travel to Miranda's house and help her with her investigation. They quickly get in over their heads as it does not seem like anyone wants them to investigate the death of Bert Grayson, a man who left the bar and was killed many years before. The deeper they dig, the more questions they uncover instead of answers. As they read the mysterious letters written by Lillian Grace, they are faced with having to unravel what is real and what is not.

Overall the story line was very interesting, but I think it would have been better for the letters to have been included in the content of the book rather than at the ending. The interactions between Lee and Miranda were curious but the chemistry just did not seem to vibe for me...

Secrets bu Mary A Russell is the test of time story of love found, denied, protected by any means, but never full fulled.
Of the secrets kept of a love that leads to a murder, but not resolved for many years.
Where even the good guys, aren’t good.
Secrets is a bewitching story.

After a couple chapters it was clearer that there was past and present events evolving. There are a lot of characters and almost too many potential culprits who could have committed the murder. While it held my interest, it sometimes seemed disjointed and ended rather abruptly. The letters they kept referring to were at the end of the book and by then not really very enlightening or interesting. I just couldn't make myself read them fully because they seemed repetitive and were referenced so often throughout the book.
This book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley for an honest review. The opinions expressed are my own.

It starts with a death 50 years in the past. Bert Grayson, after a night of bars and booze, was murdered. Cops back in the day didn't have the modern methods of locating suspects, no DNA was available. As far as they were concerned, it was bound to happen. Case closed.

Letters from Lillian Grace to Bert's sister proclaimed that she knew who had murdered the man she loved, but no one would listen to her. She always felt there was a coverup and no one could be trusted.

These letters have come to light and editor and researcher Lee Perkins along with retired FBI friend, Miranda Witherspoon, who immediately make plans to look into this very cold case.

What they find .. and what they don't ... changes everything they thought they knew. Some secrets are never meant to see the light of day.

This is a well-written mystery with likeable characters in Lee and Miranda. I enjoyed how they related to each other and to the world around them. The more I read, the faster I turned pages .. couldn't wait to see how it all ended. I was not disappointed.

Many thanks to the author / BooksGoSocial / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction/cozy. Opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

3.5 Stars