When neatly packed male body parts wash up by the River Elbe, Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her colleagues begin a perplexing investigation.

As the murdered men are identified, it becomes clear that they all had a history of abuse towards women, leading Riley to wonder if it would actually be in society’s best interests to catch the killers.

#TheKitchen #SimoneBuchholz #Rachel Ward @OrendaBooks #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #blogtour

But when her best friend Carla is attacked, and the police show little interest in tracking down the offender, Chastity takes matters into her own hands and as a link between the two cases emerges, horrifying revelations threaten Chastity’s own moral compass … and put everything at risk.

The award-winning, critically acclaimed Chastity Riley series returns with a slick, hard-boiled, darkly funny thriller that tackles issues of violence and the difference between law and justice with devastating insight, and an ending you will never see coming…

My Review

I can’t pretend that I didn’t find this a bit weird. I couldn’t work out when it was set, but I’m guessing maybe the nineties. Everyone smokes, even in pubs and restaurants, but it’s the way they concentrate on smoking, just enjoying a cigarette, rather than it being something they do while doing something else. And boy can Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her mates drink! I’d be hospitalised.

I was totally out of my comfort zone – I felt a bit like Margot in The Good Life asking what’s so funny when everyone else is in on the joke apart from me, except The Kitchen is no laughing matter. Though it has its moments of very dark humour.

So back to the story. Neatly packed male body parts have washed up by the River Elbe. But there’s no torso, just the head and limbs. Then there’s another, again just the head and limbs, and no torso, followed by the complete body of a young man. The victims didn’t know each other, and there appear to be no links. But the similarities between the first two at least, make it likely they have been killed by the same person or persons.

When the three men are eventually identified, it appears that the only link is a history of abuse towards women. In between chapters, we have small snippets of information given by a girl / woman who has suffered abuse from various quarters throughout her young life. Who is she and how is she connected to the murders?

But when Chastity’s best friend Carla is attacked and raped, and the police are slow to act, Chastity begins to question her own belief in the law and justice, and her moral compass is tested to its limit.

It was all very exciting, what with Chastity’s friends, including an ex-police officer and her sketchy boyfriend whose flat is so cluttered, there is nowhere to sit on his balcony. We also get an insight into Hamburg’s nightlife at the time.

I was really enjoying it – it’s a fast-paced, snappy, short read – and then it suddenly turned so dark, it was actually quite comical, in a warped kind of way. The Kitchen is number two in the Chastity Riley series. It’s also an excellent translation from the original German – I would never have known it wasn’t the original.

And if you want to read the first book in the series, the synopsis states that: “A serial killer is on the loose in Hamburg, targeting dancers from The Acapulco, a club in the city’s red-light district, taking their scalps as gruesome trophies and replacing them with plastic wigs.” That’s not something you read every day.

Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours

About the Author

Simone Buchholz was born in Hanau in 1972. At university, she studied Philosophy and Literature, worked as a waitress and a columnist, and trained to be a journalist at the prestigious Henri Nannen-School in Hamburg. In 2016, she was awarded the Crime Cologne Award as well as runner-up in the German Crime Fiction Prize for Blue Night, which was number one on the KrimiZEIT Best of Crime List for months. The critically acclaimed Beton Rouge, Mexico Street, Hotel Cartagena and River Clyde all followed in the Chastity Riley series. Hotel Cartagena won the CWA Crime in Translation Dagger in 2022. The Acapulco (2023) marked the beginning of the Chastity Reloaded series, with The Kitchen out in 2024. She lives in Sankt Pauli, in the heart of Hamburg, with her husband and son.

About Orenda Books

Orenda Books is a small independent publishing company specialising in literary fiction with a heavy emphasis on crime/thrillers, and approximately half the list in translation. They’ve been twice shortlisted for the Nick Robinson Best Newcomer Award at the IPG awards, and publisher and owner Karen Sullivan was a Bookseller Rising Star in 2016. In 2018, they were awarded a prestigious Creative Europe grant for their translated books programme. Three authors, including Agnes Ravatn, Matt Wesolowski and Amanda Jennings have been WHSmith Fresh Talent picks, and Ravatn’s The Bird Tribunal was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, won an English PEN Translation Award, and adapted for BBC Radio Four ’s Book at Bedtime. Six titles have been short- or long-listed for the CWA Daggers. Launched in 2014 with a mission to bring more international literature to the UK market, Orenda Books publishes a host of debuts, many of which have gone on to sell millions worldwide, and looks for fresh, exciting new voices that push the genre in new directions. Bestselling authors include Ragnar Jonasson, Antti Tuomainen, Gunnar Staalesen, Michael J. Malone, Kjell Ola Dahl, Louise Beech, Johana Gustawsson, Lilja Sigurðardóttir and Sarah Stovell.