Rating: 3/5
Review:
OK but not great
I thought Their Little Secret was OK, but no more than that. It’s
my first Mark Billington so it won’t be helped by my not having
read the previous books in the series, but even so I had my
reservations.
Tom Thorne, an
inspector in a serious crime unit, is called to an obvious suicide on
London’s Underground but feels compelled to look further into the
circumstances. (Really?) He is soon on the trail of a murderous
couple, whose point of view we also get, intercut with the police
narrative. It’s well enough done, but I found the psychologising
and supposed parallels with Brady and Hindley a bit thin, as was the
obligatory Personal Story of Thorne himself. Somehow, it all just
clunked a bit for me so that although Billington avoids quite a lot
of the clichés of the genre and generally writes pretty well, it
never quite engaged me.
Overall, I found
this competent rather than great. It would make a decent beach read,
but I won’t be rushing to read another in the series.
(My thanks to
Little, Brown for an ARC via NetGalley.)
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