A promising start of a new series with this book about Morgan Stone, FBI profiler and the two cases she is trying to solve. I have to agree with some of the other reviewers in saying that there's room for improvement when it comes to the actual writing, but the plot was in general well thought out and the ground work for future books is here. If I look at this like it's the first book in a series I can overlook the fact that Morgan doesn't have enough depth yet and I couldn't form a connection. The romance was unnecessary and didn't really feel like it belonged in this book, maybe in the second or third.
The protagonist was an interesting character who kept my attention with chilling desriptions of the crimes. There was one major issue I had though: you saw " the mistake" coming and given the fact that Morgan was described as one of the best profilers with over 20 years experience this actually almost offended me.
Overall a solid start with the potential to be really good.

*** An ARC was provided by Netgalley in exchange for a honest review. ***

Adrian J. Smith’s latest mystery novel, “Stone’s Mistake,” hit the ground running with everything a good book should contain in her sexually steamy story. She has done a great job in writing a unique plot along with strong character development, especially with FBI agent Morgan Stone. Morgan is a character carried over from her previous Stone series novel.

Lollie, the second main character, is a deranged psycho looking for someone to love, get married to, and have children with. The author did a brilliant job in developing her lethal character and descriptive part of the story.

Pax, another main character, is an FBI agent that shares an office with Stone and has a way of verbally insulting Stone and getting under her skin. It’s a love-hate personality discord between the two throughout the story. Even though there is friction between the two, they have a great deal of respect and connection for one another.

The story starts with the romantic breakup between Katie and Lollie, both lesbians. At the heat of the moment to let off steam, Lollie leaves in a huff and takes off jogging, with a minimal amount of clothing, in the depth of winter, down a residential road. Out of energy and completely exhausted standing in the road, she gets knocked down by Andrea’s car pulling into her driveway. Feeling guilty, Andrea invites Lollie inside and it doesn’t take long for these two sexually starved women to go at it. Unfortunately, the relationship ends soon in an awful way.

The e-book was an exciting read until the end. My only hope is that the author edits out redundant and overused phrases: pursing her lips, rolling her eyes, licking/licked her lips. The bottom line is that I loved “Stone’s Mistake.”

When two murders in Chicago seem like the work of a serial killer, Agent Morgan Stone, one of the best FBI profilers, takes the investigation from Fiona, a detective Morgan has had a crush on for far too long. When the profile reveals a peculiar type of killer, Morgan is all in following the killer trying to guess their next step. However, one crucial mistake threatens to take her out of the case and to let the killer scape.

This book was not what I was expecting, in a good way. The plot was well thought out and I absolutely loved being in the serial killer's mind, although of course it was very disturbing, but that shows how good the author was in writing that character. The book kept moving at a great pace and kept you engage. If I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it and what would happen next.

My only complain was the "romantic"part of the book between Morgan and Fiona. I just thought it didn't add anything to the story and felt forced. No chemistry. Perhaps on the next book we will see more of them and maybe they will grow on me. But honestly, a book like this does not need any romance. The story was engaging and nail-biting by itself.

Can't wait for the second part.

This ARC was provided via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I devoured this book. Literally, these are the types of books I long for. The fast pace, who done it type of read that keeps you on the edge of your seat.

It started smooth, sexy and sweet. And everything went down on chapter two. Most books built the characters for five, even seven chapters, Adrian J Smith was like: take this, learn it, visualize it, love it, and now let me crush this for you. The story was my book before going to bed, it brought nightmares. It was well written and bone chilling good. It was perfectly crafted, incredibly well developed and the story was not forced.

God this book... where do I even begin. Morgan is a FBI profiler who works the case of a female psychopath serial killer.

I wanna start by saying, though gruesome the crimes I loved the writing of the serial killer, Lollie’s point of view and that’s probably my biggest compliment of this book. The author did a good job at actually making Lollie a distinct character but I don’t know if the same could be said for the rest

Didn’t really connect with Morgan and almost felt like this book wasn’t enough until I noticed it’s meant to be part of an upcoming series. If not for the wondering of what’s so complicated with Fiona I probably wouldn’t be looking forward to book two.

Adrian J smith managed to put together a very interesting case of this serial killer unfortunately not as good a job as getting me hooked onto the other crime storyline which I’m assuming is gonna be the starting point of the next book. Maybe my feelings would change upon reading said book.

At times the book felt a little weak but again, this is the first book in a series it’s supposed to set everything up.

Main critique I have is the writing, it felt a bit dry at times and at moments felt as though characters were just names to an action. Most of the picture was painted through the dialogue which was cool but so much more could’ve been done with the setting be it more descriptive or personal to the characters. I felt as though Morgan definitely should’ve been a bit more effected by her situation with Lollie though that could’ve just been her avoiding her true feelings.. maybe there could be a ptsd arc coming out from this?

Dialogues were a bit too short too.

Overall not a bad book, I wanna note that my otherwise boring review of this book could be impacted by the fact that it’s a the first in a series and not much pieces together right now, for example the Fiona storyline.


Thank you NetGally and the publishers for the Arc provided for an honest review!