Ratings60
Average rating4.4
What a mess. I'm pretty sure I was supposed to be swept up in tension or tragedy but the general vibe was ‘poorly-paced and vaguely off-putting'. The ‘devotion' as described feels sociopathic rather than romantic. The puzzle presented seems to ignore the existence of cell phone records (time and duration of calls at the other end of the public telephone) or the possibility of canvassing local restaurants with a picture that they presented in other locations (the one place there where the reader knows witnesses saw suspect and victim together having an argument prior to the murder). 🤦🏼♂️
I'm not a fan of a mother/daughter team being consumed by guilt and elaborate subterfuge when there's a good case for self-defence against an abusive, threatening stalker. [I acknowledge this might be a naive overestimation of the benevolence of the ‘justice' system.] I'm not a fan of a person who is hyper-focused on a and a recognized talent in a specific field of interest, unlikely to socialize and struggling with their mental health, yet still holding down a job that requires human interaction being typified as a blank-faced calculation machine with an iffy set of ethics and one reason to live.
I much prefer a mystery where you follow a detective/scientist type along a journey of discovering the who/what/why of the murder, rather than witnessing the who/what/why at the beginning of the book, spending more time with the suspects and accomplices and trying to figure out how the ruse throwing off the investigation was accomplished.
Needless to say, I will NOT be continuing in the series.
⚠️ Misogyny, traditional gender roles/expectations, stalking, intimate partner violence/abuse, focus on traditional beauty standard, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt