Cover detail of One of the Girls by Lucy Clarke

One of the Girls by Lucy Clarke

In a postscript to my last post, my sister did ring me yesterday to remind me it was Paddy Mayne's birthday.

Read my review of SAS Rogue Heroes

I'm digressing again because I am currently in a state of confusion. At the time of writing, it is actually Thursday, as I have switched my working day for this week only. I am convinced it is Friday and that it is what I refer to as blogging day. Heaven knows what will happen when I wake up tomorrow morning, it's touch and go whether I will even make it to work.

To add to my confusion, I'm reviewing a book I actually read before Christmas. And it seemed a funny time for it to be published and/or read it. It's a page-turner, but I can't help wonder if it would have been better to have published this in time for our summer holidays. Let's see shall we?

The Plot

We were all DYING for a holiday.

A beautiful remote island, blood orange sunsets, towering cliff top view. And a building swell of lies between friends.

But who would kill for it?

My Thoughts

Well that preface doesn't sound in any way foreboding does it? I picked this up as a new read in September, and this seemed an unusual time to release this book as it is a page-turning summer read.

There has been a trend recently for this style of crime fiction, writing where a murder is committed and whilst we have no idea of who the murderer is, we also have no clue as to who the murder victim is either! It's great fun, slightly maddening as there are 2 mysteries to solve and all characters are suspected of being both. In this instance, dear reader, I did take a lazy eye over the final epilogue chapter and immediately discounted 3 of the 6 characters. In my defence and in the words of Montgomery Scott 'I could nae take it any more!'

But this is all part of the fun with a book like this. The plot covers a hen weekend with a group of friends of the Bride, all with a plethora of issues lurking in the background coming to the fore. As the action unfolds, the text is interspersed with chapters clearly written after the events and which, give absolutely no clue as to what has occurred. We know there is a red scarf involved - was this the murder weapon? Was the murderer wearing it? Or the victim?

The pages flowed by so quickly and this was a cracking page-turner. It would be a perfect read for fans of Lucy Foley's novels, and picked up at the airport to pop in your hand luggage with a bottle of Soltan for a glorious summer holiday, but maybe not a hen party!

It's a 4 Star read from me.