In the Blood

De: Ruth Mancini

Narrado por: Kelly Adams

In southeast London, a young mother has been accused of an unthinkable crime: poisoning her own child - and then leaving him to die. The mother, Ellie, is secretive and challenging - she's had a troubled upbringing - but does that mean she's capable of murder?

Balancing the case with raising her disabled five-year-old son, criminal defence lawyer Sarah Kellerman sets out in desperate pursuit of the truth. But when her own child becomes unwell, Sarah realises she's been drawn into a dangerous game.

Unsettling and compulsive, In the Blood is a chilling study of class, motherhood and power from a new star in crime fiction.

©2018 Ruth Mancini (P)2018 W.F. Howes Ltd

Fantastic! A unicorn of a book...

That one book you need when you have genre fatigue. The narration is stellar... i could find no flaws in this book. No major plot holes or leaps of logic i had to ignore. It starts strong and stays strong. It's about a mother with a profoundly disabled son. She is a lawyer although i guess she would be a solicitor since the book takes place in England.
Her work is demanding and she has no family no husband to gali her. My heart went out to her trying to navigate her career and be there for her son's needs.
She gets a case of a young woman accused of almost killing get baby with salt poisoning.
She takes the case and through her days of dealing with obstructive people who refuse to talk to her and a demanding boss wanting more billable hours were feel her exhaustion. She is easy to empathize with especially for those of us who are mothers.
She meets " the perfect man " who loves her child, is kind to her, and it seems like at least her personal life will be looking up.
That's all i can tell because this book is not a psychological thriller but there is twist which is just the cherry on top of a great read.
Hope you enjoy as much as I did.
I also read "woman on the ledge" it was also great. Looking forward to reading more from this author who by the way is a solicitor in real life.
Thank you for reading.

Couldn't stop listening!

Wow! Great story.Unusual plot and characters--not the same old thing. Satisfying ending. I highly recommend this author.

amazjng

the story is gripping..... kept me enthralled to the last word. The narration was so gripping

Mysterious

Very well narrated and a good story. Intense and kept my attention throughout the whole time

Only okay

This book could have been half the length if the disabled child outbursts were left out. Now I don't have children so maybe I'm just being insensitive but I didn't find it necessary. I actually found it extremely annoying. The sounds the narrator made grated on my nerves. The main character was not very likeable. She was an attorney but a very unprofessional one. The entire story just didn't flow well. It was really unbelievable. So... don't waste your time. I only gave it 3 stars (instead of less) because I was able to finish it.

Incredible

A modern book touching very modern issues. You warm up to it until you cannot stop listening.

Not for me

I didn't care for this book at all. I found it incredibly implausible. I don't want to get into the details of why because that would require spoilers and I don't want to ruin it for anyone else. I loved "the woman on the ledge" and wanted to read more by this author after finishing that one. In a review of another book I considered someone mentioned that reading "in the blood" first would give necessary background to the Sarah kellerman character so I decided to start here. I still want to read the other book so I stuck with this one but it was a struggle. It's not just that so much of the plot was far fetched but the limited understanding of autism and the way Sarah's autistic child was described was ignorant and offensive. The author has Sarah saying that her child will never engage in meaningful play... what? because what he enjoys isn't enjoyable for her it's meaningless? says who? Certainly not her autistic child who is enjoying himself while he plays. Nothing about the way this child was described was neurodivergent affirming whatsoever. At one point she says "he's a nightmare." As someone with autism and ADHD I found it to be in really poor taste and even worse, ignorant. She says over and over that he won't amount to anything, that he can't understand anything, etc. In the case of autism you ALWAYS presume competence. In a child who can't communicate in traditional ways, you have no way of knowing what's really going on inside. to assume it's nothing is lazy. It's a book and Ben isn't a real child but it was frustrating seeing that he was completely competent with a computer and yet she still assumes he doesn't understand anything. Why wasn't he given an AAC device? That storyline was very frustrating. So between the ignorance of autism and the inplausibility of the rest of the story, this was a total miss for me. I would not recommend it.

Narration

Engaging storyline with EXCELLENT NARRATION! An easy listen with unexpected twists…had me guessing until the end.

The best narration I've ever heard

Such a great story and the narration was PHENOMENAL! I related to Ellie and especially to the the struggles of Sarah as the single professional working mother of a disabled child. Her story resonated with me and brought me to tears more than once. Living through the pain, isolation, judgement, self-doubt, loneliness, uncertainty... her story and her desire to fight for others is my story. very well done.

The NARRATOR

I absolutely love the narrator!! If I could give her 50 stars I would. I liked the story as well but I feel like she's the reason it was good.