Firstly I need to caveat this review by pointing out that I listened to this, rather than actually read it. Personally I don’t think that listening to something is as good as actually reading, but it’s a good substitute for those moments when reading is just tricky – walking into town for example!
The main problem with listening is that a lot depends on whether or not you actually like the people narrating. Unfortunately with this book the two men who were narrating sounded rather like American robots which I found a bit off putting. However putting that aside, this was another good story by Linwood Barclay.
The story revolves around Thomas who is autistic and spends his days memorising maps using a internet programme called World360 (essentially google maps by another name) Thomas believes that Ex-President Bill Clinton has asked him to do this on behalf of the CIA in case of a terrorist attack. When his father dies, his brother Ray comes home to sort out the funeral and other arrangements. On World360 Thomas sees a women being murdered and this leads both him and his brother to get caught up in a political cover up, and to meet an ex-olympian gymnast turned assassin.
I liked the characters (well the nice ones not the murderer ones) and felt that Ray and Thomas were very believable in their frustrations with each other. As usual with Linwood Barclay books the pace of the story is fast, and is a bit of a rollercoaster from start to finish. He writes clever plots, and although I don’t think this was necessarily his best I suspect that is more to do with having to listen rather than read.
I’m not sure if I would have felt differently if I had been reading as that makes it easier to flip back and check things, but to me there almost seemed to be too many plots to follow. There was the mystery around their Dad’s death, a potential child abuse line, the murder and its reasons, the love story between Ray and a journalist, it was all a little too much for me. However once you can get those straight in your head then it is a good story.
A crime readers blog 