Slightly disappointing

I absolutely loved this writer’s early tense thrillers, so I was excited to see that she had written another stand-alone novel, not connected to a series involving the same character. It was a fairly good listen, and very well read, but somehow it lacks the page-turning quality of her early works, which I sometimes sat through the night to finish. Instead, this just seemed to be a bit dreary, with a vague sense of threat. Possibly, I am just so fed up with the same old theme within ‘psychological thrillers’ of threatened or missing children. This is usually coupled with violence, bullying or coercion from a male (in this case two men) against a female character, usually in a domestic setting. Yes, these situations are very often horribly real in our every day world, but surely thriller writers are capable of creating different scenarios, otherwise the description of ‘thriller’ doesn’t really apply, because the stories are so predictable. This isn’t a bad book by any means, but it’s just very standard, and I think Nicci French is capable of producing something much more exceptional.

5 people found this helpful

Excellent

I’ve always loved Nicci French thrillers, perhaps not so fond of the female detective series, but this one is excellent. Exciting and well narrated. I found it difficult to put down. In addition to which I didn’t want it to finish which is always the test of a good book . The problem I’m faced with now is to find something which is comparable...a difficult task indeed.

1 person found this helpful

Anti climax ending

No plot twist whatsoever. So many crazy ways it could have gone and yet another flat ending. I wonder when will the authors appreciate the really skilled build up they do throughout the book in order to stop ruining the endings with all these emotionless techniques. The ending is so flat and unrealistic it seems as if they actually have no idea what it feels like to be in these kind of situations. Not to mention that the whole Tess is another Frieda Klein under a different name. Be creative cause it is getting boring at this point.

1 person found this helpful

A good domestic thriller, brilliantly narrated

The story is well written and suspenseful - thank goodness Nicci French has got away from the obnoxious Frieda Klein -, with pleasant domestic detail. And, above all, it is brilliantly narrated. I cannot praise the reader too highly; she doesn't overact, she doesn't try to differentiate vocally between young and old, male and female characters, or between people who she decides will have different regional accents (despite which we always know who is speaking). Instead she reads us the story, without histrionics, without over-emphasis, without frills. More readers like Olivia Vinall, please!

The mind is a jumbled box

Very good insight into how we all overload or heads, and eventually it falls into place

Disappointed

I did listen to the end in the hope that the story would improve… but it was all rather unbelievable, disappointing.

Convoluted

I usually really like Nicci French but oh my goodness not this one! Completely unbelievable, repetetive and just daft. The narrator did her best but the little girl's voice just grated. Not recommended even for French fans.

Terrible narrator

The story was ok and I would have enjoyed it more had the narrator had put more feeling into her voice. She sounded as if she was bored with her one tone voice. I was, it did no justice to the book.

Like listening to a Famous Five story

I found the tone and content of this story to be banal, full of trivia, and childish - it reminded me of the days when as a child I read Enid Blyton’s Famous Five, except they were better as they were intended for children. I tried to persevere with it as Nicci French is apparently a good writer but I’ve finally given up half way. Tess, the narrator through whose eyes the story is told, initially goes to the police because her little daughter has drawn a picture of someone supposedly falling out of a building - but it appears that the the drawing is about an event/murder that hasn’t yet happened. Why should the police take the report seriously? Tess becomes the sleuth, finding a trail of clues and information that the presumably incompetent police can’t be bothered to find themselves. All men in her life become suspects. And there I gave up as I didn’t want to waste any more time on such a mundane story.

It was okay

The narrator was good. I didn’t think much of the plot and I guessed the ending.