Rating: 4/5
Review:
A good, gripping novel
This is the first of the DC Max Wolfe books that I have read
and I enjoyed it. It works fine as a
stand-alone novel, but I think it would have been better if I'd read at least
some of the earlier ones – which I intend to do now.
Girl On Fire has one of the best, most arresting openings I
can remember. The first sentence is
"I woke up and the world was gone," and we learn very soon that Max
has been caught up in a terrorist outrage and the scenes which follow are quite
brilliantly done. The phrase "You
had me at 'hello'" sprang to mind and although the remainder of the book
couldn't quite keep up the stellar standard, it was an engrossing and exciting
read. Max and various police colleagues
deal with the aftermath of the incident – tracing suspects, knocking down
doors, dealing with public reaction to events – and it's all pretty plausibly
done. Throughout, there runs the story
of Max as a single father and his relationship with his daughter (and his
ex-wife) which makes a good backdrop and also has important things to say.
Tony Parsons writes very well. He has an easy, flowing prose style and Max's
narrative voice is very convincing.
There is a tendency to indulge occasionally in slightly stilted homilies
about things like single fathers, liberal democracy and so on, but generally I
found it an easy, gripping read. My only
other reservation is that it's pretty unremittingly grim; a small leaven of
humour would have helped a lot. Books on
similar themes by, for example, Mick Herron or Khurrum Rahman (whose East Of
Hounslow I thought very good) achieve this and may be rather more effective in
their message as a result.
In short, this is a good, involving crime novel with some
intellectual weight. Recommended.
(My thanks to Random House for an ARC via NetGalley.)
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