Book Review: Retribution by Sarah Barrie

 Retribution

by

Sarah Barrie

Once a vigilante, she's now a cop....who doesn't play by the rules

 

Publisher: Harlequin Australia

 

Publication date: 30th November 2022

 

Series: Lexie Winter #2

 

Genre: Crime / Thriller

 

Pages: 347

 

RRP: $32.99 Paperback

 

Source: Courtesy of the publisher

 

My review of Retribution

Retribution is book two in the Lexi Winter series and opens with Lexi newly graduated from the Police Academy. Even though Retribution can be read as a stand-alone I would recommend reading Unforgiven as it will give you a good grasp of who Lexi is and where she has come from.

 

Currently assigned to Wyong Police Station, Lexi is hell bent on bringing down a notorious drug family, single-handedly if need be.

 

Retribution isn't quite as disturbing and hard-hitting as Unforgiven and starts off as a bit of a slow burn. I was wondering if it was going to match up to Unforgiven. I needn't have worried. As the story progresses the pace quickens and the tension rises, along with the body count.

Lexi plays by her own rules and everyone else has to fall in line. She gets results!

 

I really enjoyed the setting of Wyong, Woy Woy and Wondabyne, on the New South Wales central coast, as I know these areas and could picture them.

There are two cases under investigation; one is the murder of a building company owner and the other is bringing down the drug empire.

 

I thought it would be hard for Barrie to follow with another crime thriller that's as gritty and suspenseful as Unforgiven but when the tension in Retribution hits out of nowhere and the twists start coming all I could think was, Sarah Barrie has done it again!  

 

My rating 4.5/5       ⭐⭐⭐⭐½

 

About the author

 

Photo credit:Goodreads

Sarah Barrie is the author of nine novels, including her bestselling print debut Secrets of Whitewater Creek, the Hunters Ridge and Calico Mountain trilogies, and a new crime series starring Constable Lexi Winter. In a past life, while gaining degrees in arts, science and education, Sarah worked as a teacher, a vet nurse, a horse trainer and a magazine editor, before deciding she wanted to write novels. About the only thing that has remained constant is her love of all things crime.

Her favourite place in the world is the family property, where she writes her stories overlooking mountains crisscrossed with farmland, bordered by the beauty of the Australian bush, and where, at the end of the day, she can spend time with family, friends, a good Irish whiskey and a copy of her next favourite book.