Helpful Score: 1
This is a thriller that is so well-written you feel it must have been a real life experience and not fiction. The constant question to myself was "what would I do under these circumstances?". Highly recommended.
Helpful Score: 1
Minette Walters is one of my favorite authors and I am always excited to read one of her novels. Unfortunately, this one falls short in comparison to any of her previous books. There are parts which are brilliantly written and the tenseness and psychological elements she is known for are here - but too sparingly. It is almost like this was an earlier work, not that of the seasoned author I have come to enjoy. For the first time, I felt myself dragging my way through one of her books. Hopefully, this is just a fluke and her next novel will be up to the standard I have come to expect from her.
Another excellent story from one of the greatest mystery/crime writers in the world.
African correspondent Connie Burns is abducted in Baghdad and held for three days. When she is released she does not want to talk about it, and rumors fly that she was never actually abducted. She is a changed person, fearful and remote, and retreats to a remote cottage in England.
She assumes a different identity and simply tries to live. She tries to befriend a neighbor who has taken it upon herself to solve problems for the newcomer, but the neighbor is at least as withdrawn as Connie has become. Even so, the two form a kind of bond. Connie learns a little too much about the owner of the cottage and the owner's daughter. Probably because she is a reporter at heart, she digs for truth.
Connie's fears are well-founded. It's a thriller and a half.
She assumes a different identity and simply tries to live. She tries to befriend a neighbor who has taken it upon herself to solve problems for the newcomer, but the neighbor is at least as withdrawn as Connie has become. Even so, the two form a kind of bond. Connie learns a little too much about the owner of the cottage and the owner's daughter. Probably because she is a reporter at heart, she digs for truth.
Connie's fears are well-founded. It's a thriller and a half.
Extremely suspenseful. A very good read!
As in most Minette Walters books, the tension builds slowly but unrelentingly toward the climax. Whether Connie and Jess, the unlikely heroines, actually have committed murder is left up to the reader: did they or didn't they?
In 2002 five women are discovered barbarously murdered in Sierra Leone. Reuters Africa correspondent Connie Burns suspects a Britis mercenary: a man who seem sto turn up in every war-torn corner of Africa, whose reputation for violence and brutality is well-founded and widely known. Connie's suspicions that he's using the chaos of war to act out sadistic, misogynistic fantasies fall on deaf ears-but she's determined to expose him and his secret. The consequences are devestating.
