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canadianbookworm's review
3.0
This novel of suspense takes place when events that happened twenty years ago are called into question. Back then, Nell and her boyfriend Johnny Blanton were surprised one evening by an attacker who killed Johnny. Nell was the only witness and a culprit was soon identified, convicted and sent to jail. Later, Nell married the policeman who handled the case, Clay Jarreau, and he adopted her child by Johnny, Norah.
Now a video has come to the surface that gives an alibi to the convicted man. Nell is stunned by the news and starts to question her memory and what happened when she picked out the man. Meanwhile, Norah is acting strange and having trouble in college and won't talk to Nell and Clay about her behaviour. Clay becomes hostile in the face of Nell's search of the past and a rift opens between them. A casual friend of Nell's, LeeAnn is a reporter who is bent on tracking down the truth, and Nell learns a lot from her.
As this case gathers together the suspense builds and danger looms. Nell is the only character with real depth, although the convicted man, Alvin Dupree, has some interesting thought processes. A good page-turner with lots of action.
Now a video has come to the surface that gives an alibi to the convicted man. Nell is stunned by the news and starts to question her memory and what happened when she picked out the man. Meanwhile, Norah is acting strange and having trouble in college and won't talk to Nell and Clay about her behaviour. Clay becomes hostile in the face of Nell's search of the past and a rift opens between them. A casual friend of Nell's, LeeAnn is a reporter who is bent on tracking down the truth, and Nell learns a lot from her.
As this case gathers together the suspense builds and danger looms. Nell is the only character with real depth, although the convicted man, Alvin Dupree, has some interesting thought processes. A good page-turner with lots of action.
fmedlin's review
3.0
If you like murder mysteries, you'll probably like this as well. The author is male, but the main character is not. Can male authors really write good stories about women in 1st person?
spygrl1's review
1.0
Overall an entertaining Abrahams yarn, but not his best. What the novel lacks, I think, is a competent protagonist. The central character, Nell, wants to figure out what happened 20 years ago when her fiance was stabbed (and when she identified the wrong man as the killer) but Nell is ... naive and obtuse. I think her confusion and ineptitude are realistically drawn, but it makes narrative progress, especially in the final pages, haphazard. The only character who is intelligently, doggedly trying to piece together the truth is reporter Lee Anne, who the reader sees only through the eyes of other characters. And when (SPOILER) Lee Anne is killed, Abrahams has to resort to an unsatisfying rush of revelation and violence -- everyone converges on the Bastien mansions and exchanges injuries (blows to the head, slashing wounds, a shot to the head). The end leaves a few points hanging, and as other reviewers have noted the "coda" is disappointing. Justice isn't served and the characters' reactions seem off; both Nell and her daughter appear to forgive the man who covered up the fiance's murder and framed the wrong man, and no matter how sketchily drawn the character of the daughter is this forgiveness seems unlikely.
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