Reviews

I just didn't like this book, the men were all misogynistic, the protagaonist felt like a cardboard cutout in a 1950s drama. The author seemed think poorly of people from Dorset and reduce them to a charicature. All men and young girls cheat.

I kind of would like to know who commiteed the murders but not enough to keep reading.

On the upside it did mean I knew to look out for the Rings at Corfe rather than just staying up at the castle, and gave a real life reason for why my child should learn pythagoras!

ogokoo's review against another edition

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mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

123tezza's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

A very easy to read, relatively fast-paced crime drama. The first book in a series, which I’d be interested in following. It’s a shame more care wasn’t taken over the publishing however, with several typos and the wrong name used a couple of times.

tessreadslibri's review against another edition

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2.0

I was so disappointed with this new series from Rachel McLean. I'm not new to the author and had been looking forward to this series set close to the area I grew up in. However, I found it difficult to warm to this apparently no nonsense detective, probably something to do with the combination of peach skirt suits and court shoes with a sensible height heel - more practice manager than senior, supposedly hard nosed, detective. While this may have been used as a comment on the challenges and contradictions of gendered expectations within the police force, it wasn't. Likewise the setting was simply an opportunity to have bodies in inconvenient places and to trot out, and reinforce, well worn stereotypes about the rural/urban divide. The background of an archaeological dig had so much more potential within the narrative than simply two competing configurations of site and crime scene.
I'm not sure what happened at the end of the book. The narrative had built to a degree, then there was the reveal of the whodunit and that was it. Various strands of the investigation weren't really brought together. I know who did it and why, but only superficially. A lot of strands that would have provided a deeper insight simply weren't resolved. It was like the author ran out of time or space and just didn't tie up the loose ends. For a writer whose detective repeats the mantra of following the evidence to its conclusion, and to build a case, I would like the author to do the same with her narrative.

aaliyah_lomas15's review against another edition

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mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

beckym_reads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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