Book Tour (Review): Codex by Lisa Towles

A whistleblower, a fatal car crash, and a ghastly coverup.

Risk is nothing when you have nothing left to lose.

Codex

by Lisa Towles

Genre: Psychological
Thriller

A whistleblower, a fatal car crash, and a ghastly coverup. Risk is
nothing when you have nothing left to lose.

FBI Agent
Angus Mariner is off-grid after losing his beloved wife in a tragic
car accident. Out of nowhere, he’s approached by an eccentric old
man, a billionaire, who gives him a three-million-dollar gift…and
is discovered dead the next day. Mariner becomes a person of interest
and later a suspect in that investigation as well as the death of a
vagrant found on the beach near his residence. While investigating
the dizzying turn of events, he is contacted by a journalist, who
shares details of secret work his wife had been doing just before her
fatal accident. Digging into what feels like unlikely allegations
brings him to two unthinkable truths: his wife was a whistleblower
about to expose a ring of corruption linked to the eccentric old man,
and the fatal car crash was no accident. Out on a limb with no one
left to trust, he must decide if he alone can expose the
organization’s terrifying agenda and bring meaning to his life’s
greatest loss.

Fans of Robert Ludlum’s Jason Bourne series
will love Lisa Towles’ new fast-paced psychological thriller.

“Fast
paced and ingenious” – The Prairies Book Review

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I received a copy of Codex for an honest review. What follows is my opinion and mine alone. I was not compensated for this review.

Codex is a thriller written in the first-person POV. To be honest, it threw me off for a bit. Most thrillers, from my experience, are third-person. So, before reading, knowing the genre, I was expecting third-person. For me, I need to shift my mind to the book’s POV. I even have to do that when writing in first-person POV. That said, it took me a while to get into the book, but reading it was smooth once the shift was made.

The book starts in medias res, with our hero, Angus Mariner, breaking into a safe house with his half-sister. It ends on a cliffhanger, and the reader is transported back to the events leading up to the B&E. Angus is in the middle of grief over his wife’s death. We learn of his FBI background, his Air Force background, and the cat-and-mouse relationship he has with a detective is established. While this is going on, Angus’ brain starts turning, and he’s beginning to make connections that lead him to question if his wife’s death was an accident.

Over the months in the book, Angus is pushed and pulled into a conspiracy he couldn’t fully grasp until the very end.

As a thriller, it’s not bad. The twists were interesting. I personally didn’t care for Angus as a character, but his motivations make sense. He just wasn’t my favorite. I personally loved his sister and Rudy. She is sassy, and Rudy has that caring, unphased friend attitude. The book is well written, though I would say that there were moments I had to reread segments. I’m not sure if it was that my brain wasn’t clicking (totally possible) or if the text had a hiccup moment. I wouldn’t be able to pinpoint a certain place as to why, but I figured I would mention it in case there are other ADHD speed readers out there. You may want to take a bit of time here and there.

Overall, it wasn’t bad. Definitely check it out when you have the chance.

Lisa

Towles is an Amazon bestselling, award-winning crime novelist and a
passionate speaker on the topics of fiction writing, creativity, and
self care. She has eleven crime thrillers in print with a new title,
Codex, forthcoming in June of 2024. Her latest psychological
thriller, Terror Bay, won a BookFest Award, a Crimson Quill award
from BookViral, a NYC Big Book Award, and a Literary Titan gold medal
for crime fiction. Her June 2023 release, Salt Island, won five
literary awards including Pencraft and Readers Favorite. Salt Island
is the second book in her E&A Investigations series following Hot
House (June, 2022). Lisa is a member of Mystery Writers of America,
Sisters in Crime, and International Thriller Writers and hosts an
author interview series on YouTube called Story Impact. She has an
MBA in IT Management and works full-time in the tech industry in the
San Francisco Bay area.

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