Knife Edge by David Callinan

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Endeavour Media in exchange for an honest review.

Knife Edge is the story of Ella and Ed, two ugly teenagers at a posh private school full of beautiful people. A chance win at a gambling facility leaves Ella able to afford the best plastic surgery in the world, enabling her to make herself and Ed beautiful. Unfortunately things get complicated when their childhood bully, Scott Stockton enters the picture.

For the most part, I really enjoyed this book. The pacing is a little slow but I genuinely had no idea where it was going and the sense of horror which came from that was very enjoyable. It is a very weird story and this can make for a bit of a jarring reading experience, but once the plot kicks in properly then it becomes a very interesting tale about identity and revenge.

One thing I do have to say is this book got weirdly sexual near the end. Before the 70% mark, I'd say the only sexual aspects were plot relevant and somewhat justified by the narrative. There are two rapes in this book but both serve a narrative purpose (maybe this could have been accomplished by different acts but I'm not here to debate that). However, at the 70% mark there were some unnecessary sexual scenes which I think distracted from the actual horror of the story. The first was some characters visiting a kind of underground sex/gay club and this was full of uncomfortable characters who served no real purpose. The word transsexual is used repeatedly and the whole scene could have been cut with no harm done. The other thing which I wish wasn't in the book was a male character murdering a female character in a sexually-graphic way. It felt lazy and again, I was genuinely feeling quite tense until that happened and it just became cartoonish. These scenes both felt like they came out of nowhere and didn't fit the rest of the book for me.

That aside, Knife Edge really does have a lot to offer. The horror mostly comes from the characters but there is also plenty of violence to keep slasher fans happy. It poses some interesting philosophical debates about identity and what it means to be a good person, and it's definitely not a book I'll be forgetting in a hurry.

   Overall Rating:

.5

Silent Night by Nell Pattison

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher HarperCollins Audio UK in exchange for an honest review.

Had I realised this was a police procedural type book, I probably wouldn't have requested it. Having said that, I was pleasantly surprised by Silent Night. Paige is a deaf interpreter hired by the police to help out when a student and teacher go missing at a school for the deaf. When the teacher is found dead, the hunt for the student intensifies but with both students and staff keeping secrets, this is definitely not a clear cut case.

There was a lot going on in this book in a good way and having the main character being an interpreter did add a nice spin on the usual detective story. I liked the main character on the whole and I thought her past and life added to the plot greatly which isn't always the case with these thrillers. In particular, her relationships with her sister and her ex were some of my favourite parts of the book, and they really drove the emotional core of the story.

I listened to this as an audiobook and I would definitely recommend it this way. The main narrator was great and easy to listen to. There was an additional deaf narrator brought in to narrate some chapters from a student's point of view, something which is fantastic in concept but I feel isn't executed well. Those chapters are simply not very clear and I really struggled to make out what was happening in them. I don't think this is the fault of the narrator but more to do with the way it was recorded/produced as it mostly seems to be a volume issue, at least for me. It's a shame because it really added to the tone of the book and I think it's a fantastic decision representation-wise.

Overall, Silent Night is an engaging police procedural thriller with a unique and interesting setting. There is a lot of meat to the plot but it never feels confusing, and the strong relationship with the characters keeps you invested throughout. I would definitely recommend giving it a try and if you like police procedurals, I'm sure you will love this more than I do.

Overall Rating:

.5

The Quarry by Ben Halls

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Dialogue Books in exchange for an honest review.

I am not usually a fan of adult contemporary books in general. There's nothing wrong with them but it's very rare for one to catch my eye. The Quarry stood out to me because it focused exclusively on telling stories of men living in a desperately poor and unpleasant area. I had no idea of what to expect but I am so glad I took the chance and picked this up.

Halls' writing is truly phenomenal. It took me a few stories to get into the style and tone of this anthology but as an author, he pulls no punches with topics. Almost every character is vibrantly brought to life with his prose and he gives weightier issues all of the focus and nuance that they deserve. There are common themes throughout the stories-addiction, poverty, troubled relationships-but the content never feels repetitive and almost all of the stories earn their place here. Some of my favourites include the ones focused on the postman, alcoholic, gambling addict and the final story. All of them are good but these had the strongest sense of heart.

Several of the stories intertwine with each other but I'd actually hoped for a bit more from this element. A few stories have open endings and I half-expected them to be subtly resolved in later stories in the anthology. This sadly wasn't the case which left some endings a little unsatisfactory but I understand, that is how real life goes. The worst offender was the first story which felt like it would have had massive ramifications (for example, I would have expected a story from the POV of the manager left to deal with the fallout) but instead is never mentioned by anyone ever again. These are minor niggles but they did prey on my mind whilst reading which was a shame.

Overall though, I was incredibly impressed by this anthology. As a debut book, this has made me very excited to see more of Halls work and I definitely recommend it to anyone who likes character-focused stories with a unique twist. This is a tightly-written, wonderfully themed and very enjoyable collection and I am so glad I read it.

Overall Rating: