‘Hidden Lake’ by Ruhi Choudhary is a captivating debut novel and the first in the Detective Mackenzie ‘Mack’ Price series. She finds herself back in a town she vowed she would never return to. Mack returns as a detective in the town and finds herself investigating a missing girl which bears too much of a resemblance of another missing girl from a year ago. Both girls have disappeared from the same small town so Mack is sure that it could possibly be the same perpetrator for both girls.

This case, for Mack, is much more complex than people would think. The incident that made her vow never to return causes flashbacks still now. It doesn’t help that she finds herself needing to search some woods that are terrifyingly familiar to her.

An explosive and exciting story that held my attention from the start. A thriller mixed with a police procedural that had that many twists and red herrings throughout, these definitely kept me alert! One minute I thought I had it cracked, only to find out I was wrong and had to try and work it out again. The story is told primarily from Mack’s viewpoint and her back story is cleverly unfolded as the story develops. All I shall say is, she has had a tragic life. This shines through in her work, always wanting to get to the truth and justice for the victims, no matter how rich or poor they are. Mack works just as hard for both victims and I really like that in her.

A great opener for what is promising to be a cracking series. I will look forward to the second instalment. Thanks to Bookouture and Netgalley for the ARC so I can take part in the blog tour today.