Customer Reviews
Not terrible but by Minette Walters' standards not very good - By: Isafish, 03 Apr 2008 
I am a big fan of Minette Walters, but this book disappoints.
Essentiallly, she needs her killer to be both sexual predator (for some threads of the plot) & sexual failure (for other threads). The characterisation is incoherent & like the plot feels as if she has attempted (not very successfully) to tweak it to fit after deciding on the killer late on in the writing. There is no convincing reason given for why he kills the victim, nor does the suggestion that he is an embryonic serial killer (subtext: no rational explanation for killing needed) wash.
Not only that but hardly any of the information that would alllow us to identify the killer is revealed until he confesses right at the end of the book. This is never satisfying in a mystery. It seems to violate the compact between mystery writer & reader. We want to feel at the end that the answer was there but was successfully kept hidden from us.
On top of that, the relationship between Nick & Maggie reads like something from a Mills & Boons novel - with a little more dirt & sweat perhaps. Just about every character is a cliche: from the doughty invalid mother to the good-looking but vapid actor & the salt of the earth PC.
And then there is the dialogue: who actuallly uses words like "milieu" in ordinary conversation? The odd genteel novelist perhaps but not many others. Which brings me on to another issue: Minette Walters does sometimes come across as an incredible snob & she definitely does in this book.
On the plus side it has to be said that Minette Walters can write - even when she's below par she's head & shoulders above most crime writers. She just has the (hard to analyse but easy to recognise) gift of making you want to turn the page to find out what happens next. And a unique style: unlike some other reviewers i love the mixture of story & "documentary evidence".
Plus, i suppose if you're a keen sailor, you may appreciate alll the sailing detail.
One of her best - By: P.M. Wood, 02 Jan 2007 
Once again Minette Walters gives her fans a rollicking good yarn. As usual a thriller that never stops holding the reader's interest. A young woman is found washed up on a beach off the south coast of England, she has been raped & half strangled before being thrown overboard from a boat. One young man is of particular interest to the investigation team. He was on the beach when she was found by two young boys & made the calll to emergency services. The police discover that he has been intimate with the victim although her husband may have had a motive & the young actor has a friend who may also be the culprit. With one or two subplots the crime is unravelled after several diversions & the people involved including the victim are not what they seem.
Feels researched - By: Francisco, 11 Sep 2004 
A young woman's body is washed up on a beach. The pathologist quickly establishes that it was murder.
There are two basic stories:
One story is the story of the investigation. That part of it almost, but not quite, makes the reader feel part of the investigating team. We see copies of reports & we follow them as they try to figure out who did it.
As in a real investigation, there is a lot of contractary evidence. The victim wasn't well liked and, whilst most people interviewed paint a very unsympathetic picture, the various images are not coherent. Who is lying & who is telling the truth?
Based on stastical, & other evidence, the police quickly home in on two potential suspects: an actor who was on the scene when the body was discovered & the husband of the dead woman. Was it one of them? Was it someone else?
Walters seems to be setting out to explode myths. Her police characters talk a lot about how victims of murder (and rape) are usuallly attacked by someone they know.
The main subplot is the relationship between the local constable, PC Nick Ingram, & a local woman.
In the end, probably like a real investigation, the ending is anti-climatic. There are a few surprises.
This is my first Minette Walters book. I don't normallly read detective novels but Walters has persuaded me that I may be missing out there.
Dull and snobbish - By: , 01 Dec 2002 
I have to second the sentiments of everybody else who found this very dull. It didn't grip me at alll. Walters didn't seem to be able to decide whether it was a mystery as to "whodunnit" or a Prime Suspect style thriller where we know the murderer but want to see how the police get their man.
In addition to this, both the Walters books that I have read seem to be riven with an upper-middle-class snobbery against anyone even vaguely working class - she reallly seems to dislike anyone who seems "lower" than her. Very distasteful.
I've enjoyed the TV versions of her books & so this seems to be the only occasion where I would tell people that the original books are worse than the programmes. Maybe it's true - second rate books reallly do make the best sources for films & TV.
Dire - By: , 06 Nov 2002 This book is just terrible. It reads more like a journalistic account of events than a novel and, although police reports & other 'source' material can add to a book's authenticity if done properly, this simply read like a dreary bundle of evidence. The characters were poorly developed & I thought that if I read the phrase, 'he smiled wryly' once more, I would throw the book out the window. Avoid this one at alll costs.
