"Why confidence in men so often displays itself with a sexual edge, I don't know. Women instinctively recognise it and the suggestion of threat that can lie beneath its surface."
Clarry Pennhaligan is a waitress for Abbe's, she doesn't really know what she wants from life until she finds her true calling: snooping. When Clarry's best friend Laura asks her to find out if her boyfriend is cheating on her, Clarry gets a little too involved, and finds herself in real danger. When she discovers some deep dark secrets that the Greek community were hiding, Clarry, turned private investigator, has to switch to the tenable instincts she has as a woman; her survival depends on it.
Sounds like a warm, fuzzy crime series, right? WRONG.
I read the synopsis and thought it would be a bit of a bad ass chick lit, woman supporting woman style. Instead, it went from a girl asking her best friend to find out if her boyfriend is cheating on her, into an unforeseen escalation of a horrifically detailed Greek mafia sex trafficking ring. WHAT. To say I wasn't expecting that would be the understatement of the year.
It's actually interesting how the author has dictated this; when I saw that the cover looked fun, and read the synopsis of a girl asking her best mate to find out if her boyfriend was cheating on her, I immediately assumed it would be a light and fluffy read. My own subconscious pre-judgement stereotyped this book into the chick lit/crime genre, subconsciously I must have thought how because it would be a female detective leading proceedings, that this novel wouldn't necessarily be dark, pegging this book as harmless fun due to the leading female role, I let the synopsis become seminal, that will show me to literally judge a book by its cover.
However, I didn't particularly like this novel, and not because of how it threw me off, I was not intrinsically immersed into this novel, even when the story would dip into gruesome paroxysms that I wasn't expecting, I felt like the story was long-winded, it was a bit lustreless in its depth, and my ambivalent feelings after finishing the novel meant that I wasn't sure if I had enjoyed it or not.
Although, there was some positive body image activism thrown into these pages; which are welcome to my reading eyes. It was one of my favourite parts of this novel. Clarry is an unconventional heroine to say the least, but the way the author depicts her - and other female characters - is inspiring to any woman.
Unfortunately, to me, it felt a little messy, and the ending left a lot of loose ends, which isn't my favourite. The writing was good, but it didn't save the story.
Thank you to Net Galley and Matador Books for this ARC in exchange for an honest review....more
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