This is the most recent in the Jackson Brodie series and sees the private detective undertaking a new case that gets rapidly out of hand.
He starts of trying to find an adopted woman's birth parents but one thing leads to another (and he somehow acquires a canine companion) and he ends up being dragged into a conspiracy and uncovers secrets that had long been considered buried.
It's a good read. The range of characters that tell the story build on each others' perspectives so the story slowly reveals itself to the reader but you are never told too much too early. This keeps the intrigue going throughout, especially as it isn't immediately obvious how these characters are related. And the secret they reveal is an interesting one, but I won't give anything away.
There are a few odd things in the book though that I wasn't sure added anything. For starters there is another private detective on the scene called Brodie Jackson. He just sort of appears every now and again and causes confusion but that's about it. He's not that necessary. There was also hints of another mystery throughout concerning a young girl that one of the characters acquires which is never developed and I'll be honest at times it seems a lot more exciting than the actual story. And that I think is because the actual story seems to focus on the relationships and the people not the mystery. A lot of time is spent with Jackson just thinking about people he knew and making references to things that happened to him in the previous books (which is sometimes hard to keep up with unless you have just finished the other books).
So it's a crime thriller with a focus on the detective not the crime. Not necessarily a bad thing but if you want hard crime writing you might be disappointed. However I really like Kate Atkinson's writing so I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to her upcoming new book.
He starts of trying to find an adopted woman's birth parents but one thing leads to another (and he somehow acquires a canine companion) and he ends up being dragged into a conspiracy and uncovers secrets that had long been considered buried.
It's a good read. The range of characters that tell the story build on each others' perspectives so the story slowly reveals itself to the reader but you are never told too much too early. This keeps the intrigue going throughout, especially as it isn't immediately obvious how these characters are related. And the secret they reveal is an interesting one, but I won't give anything away.
There are a few odd things in the book though that I wasn't sure added anything. For starters there is another private detective on the scene called Brodie Jackson. He just sort of appears every now and again and causes confusion but that's about it. He's not that necessary. There was also hints of another mystery throughout concerning a young girl that one of the characters acquires which is never developed and I'll be honest at times it seems a lot more exciting than the actual story. And that I think is because the actual story seems to focus on the relationships and the people not the mystery. A lot of time is spent with Jackson just thinking about people he knew and making references to things that happened to him in the previous books (which is sometimes hard to keep up with unless you have just finished the other books).
So it's a crime thriller with a focus on the detective not the crime. Not necessarily a bad thing but if you want hard crime writing you might be disappointed. However I really like Kate Atkinson's writing so I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to her upcoming new book.
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