Well, Helen Fields has once again knocked it out the park. From the outset she sets the pace and the tone as a woman, a careful and usually alert woman, falls prey to a cruel and unflinching killer. As an opening it is chilling and you know straight away you are dealing with a cruel and disturbed mind. Midnight Jones works for Necto, the kind of annoying American style corporation where they monitor your attitude as well as your capability at work. This wouldn’t be a problem for Midnight, except that she is the sole carer for her sister and has to bring in an expensive service to look after her when Midnight goes to work. And if they are late, Midnight is late and that means not only will she get a long lecture from her boss, but she is required to apologise to all her team for not pulling her weight alongside them. But Necto is also the best payer in the field of data analysis, which is where Midnight’s skills excel, and so she puts up with it. Necto are a company specialising in the brain, and how it responds to different sets of data. From this it can profile someone to see what their responses mean about their suitability for certain kinds of work. Midnight is currently working on a University client’s list of applicants and she is analysing whether their data responses make them suitable for admission by seeing if their psychological profile makes the grade. That’s all fine until she comes across a profile that falls outside any of her known parameters. After checking that it’s not a mistake in the data, she reviews the raw data and what she sees is enough to cause her to go straight to management raising the highest alarms she can. What Midnight has found is an office joke. A Profile ‘K’. No-one has ever had one before, Midnight doesn’t even think one exists, it’s just something they’ve always laughed about, a profile that would be a perfect K for ‘Killer’. But Midnight struggles to have her concerns recognised and as she feels she’s being given the brush off, she becomes more determined than ever to find out just who is the person with the ‘K’ profile. Helen Fields knows exactly how to achieve the tension and adrenalin fuelled wild ride that is at the centre of most of her books and this one is certainly no exception. She creates great characters, imbues them with traits designed to make us love or loathe them and then makes us suspect everyone! With severe restrictions on Midnight due to her confidentiality agreement with Necto, she can’t go to the police, so she has to resort to her own initiative. Fields keeps her readers on edge; constantly guessing where the plot is going and mis-directing with the skill and precision of a great magician. And as Midnight tries to hone in on the killer, she realises that he already knows who Midnight is … and she becomes trapped in a web that threatens her friends, her family and everyone she cares about. As we hear what’s going through the killer’s mind, we understand what a high stakes game Midnight is engaged in, but how she navigates this spider’s web of razor sharp threads is a waking nightmare. There is one character whom readers of Helen Field’s work will recognise and she provides a strong resource and clarity of thinking to help Midnight find the right path. Verdict: Profile K is a cracker of a thriller with a really fascinating premise and a great character in Midnight Jones. It had me racing through the pages, wanting to know what happened next and I was completely drawn into to Necto and Midnight’s world. This is another must read nerve-shredding thriller from a woman whose books are now simply unmissable.

This is an amazing book, which I absolutely loved. It is one of the best thrillers that I have read this year. I listened to the audiobook and it was fantastic. I loved the story and the characters. It really kept me engrossed throughout. Highly recommended!

I should confess at the start to loving Helen Fields’ books. Profile K has been one of my most anticipated reads of 2024, and it did not disappoint. DI Jock Ruskin has the misfortune to be responsible for solving, what is a horrendous complex case, even by the usual standards. The crime, and crime scene, are hard for even seasoned professionals to stomach. The perpetrator enjoys the journey far more than the destination, and it shows in their work. Even as the book started, I had a sense of foreboding menace and darkness. I was genuinely feeling tense as I read, a knot of anxiety sat in the pit of my stomach. Apart from the extremely well written, gripping plot, it’s the characterisation that really drew me in. The characters are varied, vivid, flawed, lovable, despicable, human. Some I wanted to hug, others I felt far less charitable towards. I absolutely loved Doris. It is the perfect name for this character, as it was my Nan’s name, and Doris embodies all that my Nan was too. I flew through the last half of the book in one very intense sitting. The author took my emotions from fear, mistrust, anger, frustration, to “What the hell are you doing?” I was torn between not wanting to know what was about to happen next, and desperately needing to know. At a certain point of the book, I was genuinely suspecting so many people of being Profile K, even those who really didn’t deserve my suspicion. Those I wasn’t suspecting, I was fearful for. Sara Vickson’s words regarding women, towards the end of the book struck a chord. It feels poignant to be reading these words on International Women’s Day. I wish I could disagree with this character’s sentiments, but sadly it has a ring of truth to it. If you are looking for a cosy crime book, a fan of The Midsummer Murders, DO NOT read this book. The cost of therapy sessions for you will be astronomical. If you are looking for an intensely dark read, that will live in your mind and get under your skin, that will draw you in so much that you will think of it, even when you have to close the book; Profile K is the book for you. Get your pre-order in now, as you won’t want to miss out. If you weren’t sure, it’s 5⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ white knuckle, gritty rollercoaster of a read. It scared the hell out of me, and I loved it. Helen Fields, you have written an absolute corker!

Midnight is juggling her job with looking after her handicapped twin sister after their parents decide to leave them to go travelling. With a highly demanding job involving profiling applicants for interviews and a manager who has little sympathy for any personal struggles, she is disturbed when one applicant appears to be a profile K. Trying to alert the senior management proves to be futile as they close ranks and ultimately move her to another department. With an apparent serial killer in town and her fears that this applicant could be one and the same she struggles to be believed so takes matters into her own hands. A fantastic storyline that is fast paced, full of red herrings, thrilling, gory at times and certainly breath taking. A must read page turner from a brilliant author

Well once again Helen Fields has done it again another edge of your seat murder mystery.. I have no idea how she keeps coming up with new and fresh ideas but she has. Like any of her books saying a lot will give the game away but this really is a new idea and a brilliant one at that. The tension keeps ramping up until the final few chapters where you find yourself reading faster to see what happens. As with anything this author writes you know it is going to hook you in and I can not recommend it highly enough.