Denied Crimes by Daniela Alibrandi – Review Tour

“A masterful blend of suspense and introspection—this is crime fiction with depth.”

💙 Welcome, friends!

Today I’m reviewing Denied Crimes by Daniela Alibrandi, a haunting psychological thriller that digs deep into memory, trauma, and the long shadow cast by buried truth. If you enjoy dark emotional undertones wrapped in a steadily unraveling mystery, this one will absolutely keep you turning pages.

Before we dive in, here are a few pull quotes you may have seen in today’s graphics:

“Secrets don’t die—they wait.”
“Some crimes aren’t forgotten. Some are denied.”
“When truth claws its way out, no one stays innocent.”

Those lines perfectly capture the mood of Alibrandi’s storytelling: atmospheric, introspective, and unsettling in all the right ways.

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📝 All About the Book

By Daniela Alibrandi
Published by Independent Author, Independently on May 2025
Genres: Thrillers
Formats: eBook, Large Print Paperback
Pages: 237

In Rome, in the middle of a cold winter in the Eighties, preparations for Christmas are in full swing. Near the Vatican City, in a workshop of sacred objects and clothes, old Rinaldo's day begins, as always, among the tourists crowding the streets and the smell of freshly baked pizza. At the same time, Commissioner Rosco says goodbye to the agents of his team, before the imminent transfer to the Rieti police station: the punishment for a mistake made during his last case. A forced confinement that will become the opportunity to show off his intuition and investigate a crime committed thirty years earlier. The two apparently unrelated situations will intertwine in a crescendo of incredible events, after the strange death of old Rinaldo, while a creepy voice follows the entire unfolding of the narration. With her original and clear style, here imbued with faith and sacredness, Daniela Alibrandi offers the reader a multidimensional thriller full of twists, centered on the eternal struggle between Good and Evil.

📜 Excerpt from Denied Crimes

They stared at each other for a long moment, during which she also seemed happy to see his face again—his lively green eyes, the wild red tangle of beard and mustache framing his lips, and his tousled Titian-colored hair. The freckles covering his skin made him seem even more vulnerable.

They would never know exactly what happened between them, only that they suddenly found themselves kissing—wildly at first, then tenderly—as he cupped her face in his hands like it was a fragile jewel, he was afraid of breaking.

Her eyes filled with tears that seemed like despair, but maybe they were just happiness. And he kissed those tears too, as they moved together toward the bedroom—one she had cleaned meticulously—where fresh sheets, fragrant with fabric softener, awaited them.

The rest of the world disappeared as he touched her ivory skin, where the dark bruises on her slender arms stood out in an ugly contrast. Rosco kissed even those marks that marred her candor, then moved to her soft breasts, gently nibbling at the hardened nipples of her desire. And finally, he entered her—smooth and wet, warm and enveloping. He never wanted to let go of her.

A rock immersed in a restless sea—that was what he felt like in her arms—caressed by gentle waves, then struck by giant swells, overwhelmed by the high foaming of the tides, submerged by the fierce roar of the current.

" I love you; I love you; I love you…" he whispered desperately.

Not orphans, but abandoned children who now meant everything to each other—it was hard to let go, to return to their own identities. And only when their bodies finally separated, did she speak.

📚 Where to Find Denied Crimes

Available on Amazon

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✨ My Thoughts on Denied Crimes ✨

Daniela Alibrandi delivers a tense, slow-building thriller rooted in emotional truth. What struck me most is how the story pulls double duty: yes, it’s a mystery, but it’s also a character study—an exploration of the scars that shape us and the lies we tell ourselves to survive.

The narrative is layered, shifting between past and present with elegant control, almost inviting the reader to experience the protagonist’s fractured understanding alongside them. As the truth begins to surface, the tension tightens, revealing just how much was at stake all along.

The pacing is deliberate rather than breakneck, which works beautifully for the psychological depth Alibrandi aims for. Each chapter adds a puzzle piece, each memory a tremor that foreshadows the emotional quake to come. And when everything finally snaps into place, the payoff feels both earned and quietly devastating.

If you enjoy thrillers that lean into atmosphere, introspection, and moral ambiguity, Denied Crimes will be a standout read.

I received a copy of the book as part of this tour. This review reflects my honest, unbiased opinion.

About Daniela Alibrandi

Daniela Alibrandi is the author of successful thrillers and noirs in Italy and abroad. With her sixteen published novels, five English editions and many short stories she is often guest on Italian RAI television and radio broadcasts, she is present in the most important national literary Italian book fairs.

Some of her Italian editions are present in Harvard and Yale libraries as well as in New York Public Library. She has won numerous national literary awards, including the Women Arts Week 2022 for her literary career.

For years and from various sources, such as literary critics and reviewers, this author’s style has been defined as multidimensional, until it was officialized as MultiDimensionCrime (Acronym MDCrime). A reading experience that forges imagination in a multi-dimensional way. In the complex and intertwined plots of her novels, which lead to sudden and unexpected twists, the characteristics of different strands are harmoniously blended. The reader follows the investigation to solve a murder and at the same time he amazingly enters the mind of the killer, reasoning alongside him, preparing the crime with him, and even partaking in the victims’ despair and terror.

All in a growing suspense, both during the narration and in the final pages, when the reader often has to question all the beliefs he has developed during the reading.

On last July 18th, Daniela Alibrandi published her English edition of the book “Crimes After Hours”. And the settings the author chooses are always amazing and palpable. That’s what we find in “Crimes After Hours”, set in the city of Rome and in its underground world, during the late Seventies.

“Crimes After Hours,” in its Italian edition, has won two national literary prizes (Mondadori Contest and Grottammare Noir Competition) and is the first of the MDCrime series Rome’s Multi-Dimensional Crimes, set in Rome’s undergrounds between the late Seventies and the Eighties, whose plots are not connected and can be read independently, all standalone.

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🌟 Closing Notes

Denied Crimes is a suspense novel that rewards patient readers with emotional depth and a chilling, satisfying unraveling of truth. I appreciate thrillers that go beyond the surface crime and explore the people shaped by it—and Alibrandi delivers exactly that. Atmospheric, thoughtful, and haunting.

If this sounds like your kind of read, I highly recommend adding it to your list.

Good luck, and happy reading! 💛

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