The first chapters of this book made me want to put it down and never see it again. The writing was the problem. Everything the characters said made me roll my eyes.
I don't know if things got better or I got use to it but after those first chapters, I started liking the book, but not loving it. The characters were meh. So was the plot. It felt familiar all the way through. Certainly not adding anything to the plethora of these types of books but enjoyable enough.
The reason I've taken two stars off my review is for the bad beginning and the end. I want endings to feel deserved. If I've been reading something for 300 pages, then those last 50 need to bring it all together and it needs to make sense. This book tried but largely failed to do so.
Spoiler Alert of sorts but the bad guy's motivations are never really dealt with to the degree I wanted them to be.
Overall, 3 stars but that is not to say it is bad. I may even check out a second one, dependent on how it sounds, of course.

This debut novel by Shawn Wilson features homicide detective Brick Kavanagh  who has been in the business for quite a while. He is called to the scene of the body of a young woman floating in the tidal basin of Washington as the cherry blossoms bloom. While he and his partner puzzle out who killed her, Brick learns that a young immigrant named Jose who works part-time at a bar that Brick frequents has turn't up for several days. He decides to help his friend the bar owner by trying to locate Jose. He and his partner go to Jose's apartment and find that Jose has been nastily killed. They find out that the young woman whose murder they are investigating is Jose's sister. But another team is assigned Jose's homicide. They rapidly conclude that it is gang-related. But Brick has his doubts because a colleague in another jurisdiction has informed  of another young woman found floating. There is a striking resemblance to Maria, Jose's sister. Brick and his partner begin to suspect a serial killer is at work. But this clashes with the gangland theory of the other team which is favoured by their supervisor. To complicate matters a young Hispanic is brought in for Jose's murder and during his preliminary hearing he pleads guilty. Brick approaches his gorgeous female Hispanic attorney.  As they realize that the suspect has pleaded guilty to protect his family from threats, the suspect is murdered in custody, ostensibly a suicide.
Meanwhile a serial predator has access to all the crime reports and evidence. Can he be stopped before he wreaks more damage?

I recommend this novel to those who like police procedurals.

This is a well written and entertaining story with great characters. Unfortunately, the plot isn't much, and thus the progress is very slow.

Brick and Ron catch a new case when the body of a young woman is found floating in the Tidal Basin. The style of writing makes for easy reading. The book includes great personal interactions that contribute to the entertainment value. The characters are unique and different, and they are developed in depth. The investigation leads to a murderer, but not after serious issues, which include Brick quitting his job. The descriptions match well with my knowledge of DC, and should be educational for those who have never visited. The plot is a little hokey, and the ending includes an element of sadness. I would call this good entertainment.

When homicide detective Brian “Brick” Kavanagh is assigned to the case of a young woman found floating in the Tidal Pool in Washington, D.C., the last thing he expects is a second murder to suddenly create an immediate and personal tie between himself and the victim. Hamstrung by a senior officer more interested in optics than actually solving crimes, Brick isn’t about to let this one slip through the cracks.

The premise was interesting, and with victims from Guatemala and ICE agents getting involved, timely. I liked the relationship between Brick and his homicide partner, Ron, and there was a minor romance involved too with Lily Nguyen, a defence attorney. I didn’t see the solution coming at all, and looking back, it’s because there weren’t any clues planted, something which is a bit of a problem in a murder mystery. The reader likes to either solve the mystery ahead of the protagonist, which gives us something of a smug feeling when we’re ‘smarter’ than they are, or to be surprised BUT be able to look back and spot the clues we SHOULD have put together to solve it. There were no clues, and we barely got any real insight into the killer’s psyche, also something a reader likes to get in this genre.

While grammar, language and punctuation were generally good, I did spot a few changes of tense which read awkwardly… for example “When budget time rolls around maybe this would be the year for upgrades”. ‘Rolled’ would be the correct tense in this instance. These were for the most part fairly minor and I could ignore them, but I couldn’t ignore the fact that the story just didn’t grab me and, at the end, just completely fizzled out. Relentless definitely doesn’t describe Kavanagh. He literally stumbled onto the answer, mostly because the murderer inexplicably decided to hang around with him. Comparison’s to Harry Bosch are definitely premature; maybe the author can do more with this character later in the series, but I doubt I’ll be reading any more. I couldn’t bring myself to care. Two stars.

Strong entry into a very crowded field as hard-boiled cops and murders can be found in abundance. But Wilson’s entry is welcomed. The plot development and characters are well-developed. The story moves at a a quick pace, and keeps the reader coming back for more. Hopefully there will be more stories to come as well.

Actually, this isn't a bad effort overall - certainly for a debut novel. At the same time, I have to say that compared with top-rated police series writers like Jonathan Kellerman (Alex Delaware) or Michael Connelly (Harry Bosch), this one reads more like Dick and Jane.

In part that's because I just can't relate to a guy knicknamed "Brick" - even if (or maybe because) it comes as a result of his red hair. Beyond that, I'll compare it to old commercial for pasta sauce that proclaimed, "It's in there." That's true here as well, but the pot needs stronger ingredients - whether that be more adult-like dialogue, smoother transitions or more fleshed-out characters - before I can call the result delicious and, perhaps more importantly, truly be eager to read the next installment.

The main character's real name is Brian Kavanagh; at age 42, he works with his partner Ron Hayes in Washington, D.C. (somewhere I read that Ron's hair is in "dark dreads," so I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that he's African-American). Early on, they get called in when the body of a young woman turns up in the Tidal Basin; her ID can't be determined at the scene, but she's got a birthmark that may prove relevant. Not long after, Brian (yes, I really do refuse to call him Brick) and Ron get involved with the case of a missing immigrant worker at their favorite watering hole. Not long after that, the officers realize that his case and that of the murdered woman may be linked. As if all this weren't enough to keep them busy, they have to deal with a pair of police partners known to be in cahoots with a high-level muckety-muck who will stop at nothing to get his next promotion - prompting Brian to take an action that could forever change the course of his life.

Then another body turns up in another jurisdiction, making Brian suspect that a serial killer may be on the loose. That's underscored by a couple of chapters seemingly written by said serial killer, although they're inserted rather haphazardly and really don't add anything to the plot. When a man unexpectedly pleads guilty to a couple of the murders, Brian gets even more suspicious and teams up with the man's beautiful, intelligent defense attorney (oh gosh, can you guess where that will go)? Compounding the confusion, a medical examiner overlooks a crucial clue that would have stood out like a sore thumb to even the most inexperienced newbie. All that said, everything gets resolved in the end - most things satisfactorily, one not so much.

As I said early on, taken as a whole this book really is quite readable and definitely, positively shows promise - but it's sort of like a steak without much sizzle. Admittedly, this one won't make my Top 20 list of favorites for 2019, but I do thank the publisher for offering it to me to read and review.

It took me a little while to get into the story but once I connected with the character of Brick, I wanted to know what would happen next.  In many ways, this was a mystery novel like many others.  In some ways, it felt like I might have read it before; but there were enough twists in the plot to keep the book interesting.  Some unexpected and sad developments caught me off guard.  Overall, a pretty good read.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Oceanview Publishing for a review copy of Relentless, the first novel to feature Washington Metro PD detective Brian “Brick” Kavanagh.

When the body of a young woman is found floating in the Tidal Basin Brick and his partner, Ron Hayes, are assigned the case. The discovery of a second body links the cases together and suddenly Brick is involved in a task force, but not for long as a quick arrest seems to resolve the case although he’s not so sure.

I enjoyed Relentless which I was keen to read, having seen it recommended in an American newspaper article. I wouldn’t say that it lives up to the hype, being rather low key until the action packed ending and slightly too American for me, among other things the constant references to baseball went way over my head. Nevertheless I found the plot interesting enough to keep turning the pages. It is a gradual accumulation of knowledge, although not in the sense of a straightforward investigation as the plot takes an interesting turn I’m not going to reveal, rather than a series of dramatic reveals until a final explosive flurry of action and reveals at the end. I had no idea of the perpetrator until then but a few chapters from his point of view over the course of the novel hint at the motive.

I don’t know anything about the author but this has the feel of a debut about it. It isn’t slick and tends to get bogged down in minutiae, like what Brick eats and drinks to the detriment of the investigation. I did, however, enjoy the storyline and would be interested in reading a follow up to see not only where Brick goes next but if it has a little extra polish.

Relentless is a solid novel and an easy way to pass a few hours.