This was a massive disappointment for me. I remember loving Tram Car 015, so now I'm wondering whether I was reading less critically back then or if this novel just does not work.

My problems with this book are mainly the writing, the plot, and characters. Since the beginning of the book I felt like I had seen this movie 100 times. The plot, if you take out the cool worlddbuilding, is thoroughly unoriginal and uninspired.

The simple plot also moves forward at a snail's pace, and the book is at least twice as long as it should have been. It's full of tropes, such as her getting a new partner BUT SHE ONLY WORKS ALONE and then after a stupid and unnecessary conflict they become besties.

The main character's main characteristic is her obsession with her clothes. They were cool, for sure, but she was much more preoccupied with her suits than her job. I didn't mind the suits, even if it doesn't make sense that she would be exempt from wearing a uniform. It's just that she should have focused more on other things.

She also doesn't seem like a very competent police officer. People literally chase after her to hand her key pieces of information. She does very little investigating and when she does it, it's almost half-hearted. Sometimes it takes her ages to come to an obvious conclusion, sometimes she just invents something that is of course right.

She also brings her lover to fight the criminal. That is, a civilian. Beating up suspects with the blessing of the police. How does that make sense?

The story tries to be self-aware at one point, making a joke about villains making their villain-speeches - which the villain then does. This, of course, includes a we're not so different, you an I, followed by I'm nothing like you. (“No, really. I do mean it. We’re alike in a way.”; “I’m not like you.”). The villain also laughs maniacally ("A long silence followed, only broken by [villain's] slow laughter. It grew louder as [villain] basked in [their] triumph.")

I hated the writing also on the sentence level. Clark writes unbearably short sentences, like he could only come up with two words at a time and couldn't be bothered to tie them into a full sentence. Not only that, all the characters also speak in this exact same way, so I don't think it's a stylistic choice. (Also he used a lot of exclamation marks! In the narration! Like in a children's book!)

I don't want to spoil the book too much, but here are a couple examples:
The abandoned  blunderbuss. Out of ammunition. But still useful.
Next paragraph, He never saw it coming. Had likely thought her dead. Or incapacitated. His mistake.

I appreciated how much Clark incorporated Egyptian culture, society, and specifically Egyptian Arabic in the book. Sometimes it was a little bit too much and made it hard to understand what was going on. For example,
They wore full-length black kaftans with red tarbooshes. Seated on the modish moss-green divan were three women, each dressed in a black sebleh and wrapped in a milaya lef. Their faces were hidden behind matching bur’a, though their heads were strangely uncovered.

It's nice that he took into account the fact that in Egyptian Arabic the letter usually translliterated as q or kh is not pronounced, but writing burqa instead of bur'a could have made at least this part more understandable. I also don't understand the point of characters sometimes saying aywa. That just means yes. Why can't you write yes?

I guess that's most of my complaints. I could go through the book page by page and find something to criticize, but maybe it's better for everyone if I don't. I can't in good conscience recommend this to anyone, except for the ones that are 90% interested in world-building and 10% interested in good writing.