This backlog of reviews is defintiely more nagative than positive, I'm sorry to say! I've been away from Britain for so long now that I like to read a good Brit novel from time to time, to reconnect in a relaxing way that doesn't involve airports and rental cars, but this really wasn't the escape I'd been hoping for. I think any novel that has to announce itself on the cover as "A Gripping British Mystery Thriller" has some sort of an identity crisis. It's also listed as "Anna Burgin book one" which means a series, and so I'm usually not interested, but I started reading anyway and I got what I deserved.
For reasons unknown, it's set in London in 1993. London I can understand. 1993 not so much. I'm not a fan of novels set in the past, but I let that slide. Investigative journalist Clare Woodbrook is working on an exposé of police corruption, specifically of Detective Chief Inspector Graham March. Now you know from this that when Clare goes missing it's March who's going to be looking for her, and sure enough, that's exactly what happened. Predictable.
Clare of course took off one afternoon for a secret meeting and despite Danny being her investigative assistant, she tells him nothing about this 'risky venture' she's embarking on, Clare's a moron. Her behavior is predictable in a story like this, and realistically, it makes no sense. Danny has a 'flat mate' - someone who shares an apartment (called a flat in Britain) with him - who is a " feisty fashion photographer" named Anna Burgin - the one of the series title. She doesn't appear until chapter five and when she does, there's an abrupt shift to first person - a voice I typically detest and a shift in voice I abhor.
That was when I quit reading because I was already sick of this dumb book by that point and first person voice just made it ten times worse. It's like shifting down from third gear to first. Obviously there's no reason to ever do that, and it turned this novel into a grind for me. I can't commend this based on what I read of it. I sure wasn't about to read some 300 pages, let alone a whole series of it.
