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NATALIE: A young mother brutally murdered. The Search for her killer. A True Story
Following the gruesome discovery of the badly decomposed dismembered body of Natalie Clubb in a remote Hull drain in late July 1998, DCI Paul Davison and his team of detectives are faced with a seemingly impossible investigative challenge. The pathologist cannot say when she died. There is no forensic evidence. There is no scene of the crime. There could be hundreds of suspects. Paul realises that he will have to think differently if he is to crack the case and bring Natalie’s killer or killers to justice. But some of his decisions bring him into conflict with the force, and false allegations of racial discrimination from a junior officer threaten his career. Paul’s honest and down-to-earth inside perspective, vividly captures the painstaking nature of how his investigation progresses amidst Hull's criminal underworld driven by heroin addiction and prostitution.NATALIE gives the reader the unique opportunity to follow Paul’s journey as he struggles to solve his first high profile murder case. It offers a fascinating insight into the world of humble real-life detectives and observe their extraordinary commitment and compassion when faced with the only thing that justice for Natalie. The final part of this true story captures the fight for justice at Crown Court with only a slim chance of a guilty verdict. The prosecution witnesses are drug-addicted prostitutes, dealers and pimps, and the evidence presented is purely circumstantial in nature. Will the jury believe a word they say? And will Natalie be able to finally rest in peace? Paul has a second book - 'RACHEL'. It is a true story based on the disappearance of Rachel Moran in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2003, in Hull.
349 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 19, 2020
49 people are currently reading
21 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
October 1, 2021
Gripping throughout
From start to finish Paul had me gripped. I could have cried for him and with him in parts of this book. How he saw, and treated Natalie as a human being throughout was fantastic. It made me see a different side to policing completely. Thank you for being there for her Davo
From start to finish Paul had me gripped. I could have cried for him and with him in parts of this book. How he saw, and treated Natalie as a human being throughout was fantastic. It made me see a different side to policing completely. Thank you for being there for her Davo
February 16, 2021
Was recommended to read this book by a colleague who worked with Paul. It was a good book which I enjoyed with some great insight into such a big investigation.
April 2, 2021
Brillant insight into the thoughts of a SIO
A journey through a awful crime from start to finish and the feelings of the senior officer who lead the case.
A journey through a awful crime from start to finish and the feelings of the senior officer who lead the case.
June 16, 2021
Natalie
Great read couldn't put it down. I would highly recommend this book. I will download his next book to read.
Great read couldn't put it down. I would highly recommend this book. I will download his next book to read.
August 2, 2023
Brilliant
January 22, 2022
In all honesty I don't know why I bought this book. I read the author's other novel and I guess as that wasn't so bad I thought, I know, I'll get this one too. If you want to read my review of 'Rachel: A beautiful young woman abducted and murdered. The Search for her Killer. A True Story.' you'll find this in my reviews or by going to that book and looking at the reviews there I guess. But my goodness the author really needs to make his titles shorter doesn't he?
This is another book that wasn't all that bad, but it wasn't great either. As with Rachel, Natalie is another book written by the now retired investigating officer. And as much as it showed in that first novel I read that it wasn't written (or even ghost written) by a professional writer, it shows here too. The books were only released two months apart in 2020 so I'm not really sure which was written first, but it's safe to say that in whatever order they were written, the author definitely didn't learn from his mistakes.
As well as lots of police acronyms used, there are again lots of abbreviations used too, such as 'I'd' instead of 'I had' or 'I would', and again this distracted me from the story he was trying to get across about the Natalie of the very long winded title. All either of these books would need is a little editing and I'm sure they would be getting a lot more attention. That's not an offer by the way Paul, I can't even get around to editing my own novel, but then I'm not trying to sell it to the unsuspecting public in its unedited form either.
Natalie's story is a really sad one. She was a mother to three kids, two of which were young daughters who she took with her to Hull to start a new life. She quickly fell in with the wrong man and ended up living a life of drugs and sex work to fund both hers and her boyfriend's habits. She ends up brutally murdered as the title says, and parts of her dismembered body are found by police, sparking the investigation into her death.
If you're from the local area this story might spark slightly more interest than if you're not, but even so, if you're a fan of true crime or investigative stories then this might be one you find interesting. It's only really the writing style that I didn't enjoy. The story itself is a sad but interesting one, and it's nice to know what the outcome of it was. Mr Davison appears to have been a decent detective, and a man who always looked upon the victims of the crimes he was investigating as human beings, rather than as a statistic or a piece of a puzzle. It's just a pity his books aren't better written as I'm sure he has lots more interesting stories where the previous two came from. Regrettably I think this will be the last one of his I read however.
This is another book that wasn't all that bad, but it wasn't great either. As with Rachel, Natalie is another book written by the now retired investigating officer. And as much as it showed in that first novel I read that it wasn't written (or even ghost written) by a professional writer, it shows here too. The books were only released two months apart in 2020 so I'm not really sure which was written first, but it's safe to say that in whatever order they were written, the author definitely didn't learn from his mistakes.
As well as lots of police acronyms used, there are again lots of abbreviations used too, such as 'I'd' instead of 'I had' or 'I would', and again this distracted me from the story he was trying to get across about the Natalie of the very long winded title. All either of these books would need is a little editing and I'm sure they would be getting a lot more attention. That's not an offer by the way Paul, I can't even get around to editing my own novel, but then I'm not trying to sell it to the unsuspecting public in its unedited form either.
Natalie's story is a really sad one. She was a mother to three kids, two of which were young daughters who she took with her to Hull to start a new life. She quickly fell in with the wrong man and ended up living a life of drugs and sex work to fund both hers and her boyfriend's habits. She ends up brutally murdered as the title says, and parts of her dismembered body are found by police, sparking the investigation into her death.
If you're from the local area this story might spark slightly more interest than if you're not, but even so, if you're a fan of true crime or investigative stories then this might be one you find interesting. It's only really the writing style that I didn't enjoy. The story itself is a sad but interesting one, and it's nice to know what the outcome of it was. Mr Davison appears to have been a decent detective, and a man who always looked upon the victims of the crimes he was investigating as human beings, rather than as a statistic or a piece of a puzzle. It's just a pity his books aren't better written as I'm sure he has lots more interesting stories where the previous two came from. Regrettably I think this will be the last one of his I read however.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews