The dangerous kind by Deborah O’Connor #bookreview #ARC #providedforreview

BOOK BLURB

What if the people we trust are the ones we should fear? 

We all recognise them. Those who sit just on the fringes of society. Who send prickles up the back of our necks. The charmers. The liars. The manipulators. Those who have the potential to go that one step too far. And then take another step.

Jessamine Gooch makes a living from these people. Each week she broadcasts a radio show looking into the past lives of convicted killers; asking if there was more that could have been done to prevent their terrible crimes.

Then one day she is approached by a woman desperate to find her missing friend, Cassie, fearing her abusive husband may have taken that final deadly step. But as Jessamine delves into the months prior to Cassie’s disappearance she fails to realise there is a dark figure closer to home, one that threatens the safety of her own family . . . 

——-

From the get-go I am going to state – THIS IS NOT A NEGATIVE REVIEW (but it’s also not an overly positive review).

The writing was good.

The pacing was good.

There were lots of twists that kept me guessing.

The characters, well some of them were good, but they all made for a gripping read and in particular, I loved Jessamine.

BUT and it’s quite a big but…

I just didn’t love the book, but I also didn’t dislike it.

It was probably me, not the book.

Anyway…

Right at the beginning I did get a bit muddled with all the different characters and timelines and then again towards the end when all the twisty turns were coming left, right and centre. At times I had to re-read a bit until I figured out why… SPOILER… was happening.

Of all the POV’s I found Jessamine’s storyline was the one that I really wanted to stick with, I loved that she was an older woman with a load of real-life problems who held it all together and still pursued her gut instinct about the disappearance. She was my sort of character.

I would like to discuss the book blurb, and in this case, it was the book blurb and not me.

The book blurb doesn’t focus or elude to the very prominent theme of child abuse. The book deals with some very dark issues and some very dark and twisted people. It’s just not something I care to read about, especially when I wasn’t expecting too. At points, the story makes for a very uncomfortable and unsettling read, which isn’t what I usually want when I pick up a novel. If I hadn’t received the book for review, I might have DNF it somewhere near the beginning.

I have read other reviews for The dangerous kind by Deborah O’Connor that use the word – relevant. And yes, novels like these are relevant, just turn on the TV and watch the news. But I do think a little heads up in the book blurb should be standard.

But for some reason or another that I’m sure I haven’t explained well the book just didn’t quite work for me. I would never tell anyone not to pick it up because I’m sure it has the potential to do well and has a lot of positives. But for me it was just ok, it was maybe even good in parts, I just didn’t love it.

However.

After all of that, I am off to see what else Deborah O’Connor has written because I enjoyed her writing and I have a feeling I could be a fan of hers… only time and some more pages will tell.

And as a last thought.

I love, love, love the cover art.

The dangerous kind by Deborah O’Connor will be published on the 16^th May 2019.

I received a copy of The dangerous kind by Deborah O’Connor from the publisher, via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.