Book Review - Scaredy Cat by Mark Billingham
Category Book Reviews
Getting out of the tech genre for awhile, I relaxed with Mark Billingham's Scaredy Cat. This is his follow-up to Sleepyhead (that I really liked)...
A number of killings in England has Tom Thorne looking for a serial killer. The victims are found in pairs, and although the methods are similar, the intensity of the violence is different. He figures there are actually a pair of killers working in tandem. The pair of killers go back to a grammar school friendship, and it's the typical controller/controllee type relationship. The cops quickly get one of the killers, but then try to set a trap for the other one. Unfortunately, the trap backfires and the killer starts to strike closer to home. The question becomes can he be stopped before he kills someone close to Thorne.
As I mentioned above, I really liked Sleepyhead. Very dark, and hard to tell who was guilty and who was innocent. Scaredy Cat was just as dark, but the suspense wasn't there. You find out right away who the killers are, but you're not quite sure about the current identity of the controlling personality. The relationship between the killers is rather complex and somewhat ill-explained, and one of the common elements that tie them together is left to hang out there for far too long. When it's finally revealed, it doesn't seem to have the impact that it was probably intended to. Thorne's personal torments don't seem to do anything but sit there. The relationship between his partner Holland and a female cop with issues also doesn't seem to add anything to the storyline.
Maybe it's just the sophomore jinx, but this novel definitely isn't on par with his first...
Getting out of the tech genre for awhile, I relaxed with Mark Billingham's Scaredy Cat. This is his follow-up to Sleepyhead (that I really liked)...
A number of killings in England has Tom Thorne looking for a serial killer. The victims are found in pairs, and although the methods are similar, the intensity of the violence is different. He figures there are actually a pair of killers working in tandem. The pair of killers go back to a grammar school friendship, and it's the typical controller/controllee type relationship. The cops quickly get one of the killers, but then try to set a trap for the other one. Unfortunately, the trap backfires and the killer starts to strike closer to home. The question becomes can he be stopped before he kills someone close to Thorne.
As I mentioned above, I really liked Sleepyhead. Very dark, and hard to tell who was guilty and who was innocent. Scaredy Cat was just as dark, but the suspense wasn't there. You find out right away who the killers are, but you're not quite sure about the current identity of the controlling personality. The relationship between the killers is rather complex and somewhat ill-explained, and one of the common elements that tie them together is left to hang out there for far too long. When it's finally revealed, it doesn't seem to have the impact that it was probably intended to. Thorne's personal torments don't seem to do anything but sit there. The relationship between his partner Holland and a female cop with issues also doesn't seem to add anything to the storyline.
Maybe it's just the sophomore jinx, but this novel definitely isn't on par with his first...
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