Scan barcode
A review by esdeecarlson
Who Took Eden Mulligan? by Sharon Dempsey
1.0
[This book was provided to me by the author via NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review]
1 star
This book was a big miss for me both in terms of plot and writing style.
Plot-wise: I think this book might work for someone who is particularly interested in cold-case fiction. Based upon the premise and the opening chapters, I had believed that this would be a crime-fiction thriller involving a cold case that comes to light due to being tangled with a contemporary murder case, which is a premise that has worked really well for me in the past (see: The Night Shift by Alex Finlay). Unfortunately, this premise failed to deliver. While a cold case does come up due to a current murder case, it was also independently under review by the same detective at the time of the new case, and so the narrative focuses almost exclusively on said cold case. We never find out anything about the present-day murder victims until 39% of the way through the book, which was just weird to me, and very unsatisfying. It felt a very backwards way to approach investigative priorities.
I’ll also say that the solutions to both cases are ultimately kind of unsatisfying in that they’re a little convoluted and mainly something the detectives stumble into through routine policework rather than ‘solving,’ which may certainly be how these cases realistically work but doesn’t make for terribly interesting fiction, in my personal opinion.
Writing-wise: The dialogue, both internal and external, is so flat. None of it feels like something a person would really say. Our two main characters, a detective and a forensic psychologist, are so boring, and constantly repeat the same sentiments about their lives in their internal monologues. Most of the book is devoted to their internal musings about their family lives and careers, which are astonishingly bland.
The book also fell into some of the classic, overplayed, rather boring gender stereotypes of crime fiction, without bothering to bring any new angles or make any sort of commentary on them. Our heroes are a tall male detective and an attractive female forensic psychologist. The male detective’s story revolved around his recently failed marriage, due in part to his wife’s mental illness and his own neglect of his relationship in favor of his job, while also lusting after his attractive female partner. The female forensic pathologist’s story revolved around her being an ‘ice queen’ with commitment issues and a need for control in her relationships, due to her tragic family backstory. Add on that there’s a fair bit of commentary about how absent fathers aren’t a very big deal but absent mothers utterly destroy their children, because… well, no reason is given, it’s stated as a fact. I was frankly shocked to read in the ‘about the author’ section at the end of the book that Dempsey studied women in crime fiction for her postgraduate degree.
I believe this book is the first in a planned series; I will not be reading any sequels.
1 star
This book was a big miss for me both in terms of plot and writing style.
Plot-wise: I think this book might work for someone who is particularly interested in cold-case fiction. Based upon the premise and the opening chapters, I had believed that this would be a crime-fiction thriller involving a cold case that comes to light due to being tangled with a contemporary murder case, which is a premise that has worked really well for me in the past (see: The Night Shift by Alex Finlay). Unfortunately, this premise failed to deliver. While a cold case does come up due to a current murder case, it was also independently under review by the same detective at the time of the new case, and so the narrative focuses almost exclusively on said cold case. We never find out anything about the present-day murder victims until 39% of the way through the book, which was just weird to me, and very unsatisfying. It felt a very backwards way to approach investigative priorities.
I’ll also say that the solutions to both cases are ultimately kind of unsatisfying in that they’re a little convoluted and mainly something the detectives stumble into through routine policework rather than ‘solving,’ which may certainly be how these cases realistically work but doesn’t make for terribly interesting fiction, in my personal opinion.
Writing-wise: The dialogue, both internal and external, is so flat. None of it feels like something a person would really say. Our two main characters, a detective and a forensic psychologist, are so boring, and constantly repeat the same sentiments about their lives in their internal monologues. Most of the book is devoted to their internal musings about their family lives and careers, which are astonishingly bland.
The book also fell into some of the classic, overplayed, rather boring gender stereotypes of crime fiction, without bothering to bring any new angles or make any sort of commentary on them. Our heroes are a tall male detective and an attractive female forensic psychologist. The male detective’s story revolved around his recently failed marriage, due in part to his wife’s mental illness and his own neglect of his relationship in favor of his job, while also lusting after his attractive female partner. The female forensic pathologist’s story revolved around her being an ‘ice queen’ with commitment issues and a need for control in her relationships, due to her tragic family backstory. Add on that there’s a fair bit of commentary about how absent fathers aren’t a very big deal but absent mothers utterly destroy their children, because… well, no reason is given, it’s stated as a fact. I was frankly shocked to read in the ‘about the author’ section at the end of the book that Dempsey studied women in crime fiction for her postgraduate degree.
I believe this book is the first in a planned series; I will not be reading any sequels.