What’s it about?
Tomorrow should be the greatest day of Erica Stroud-Jones’s life. In just 24 hours this brilliant young scientist will present her secret work to a conference in Amsterdam – research that promises to revolutionise the battle against a deadly tropical disease. Millions of lives could be saved; a Nobel Prize beckons.
Arriving to watch her are sceptics and rivals, admirers and enemies. Erica’s own eyes will be on sculptor Max Carver, her American new love to whom she will dedicate her achievement.
Tomorrow never comes.
Erica vanishes during the night. Max, desperate, terrified, sets out to find her, descending into an underworld full of malice and cunning. But even he is shocked by the dark terror he finds in the heart of the woman he loves.
My thoughts
This was our book club read for May and one I was quite intrigued about. Billing your novel as “the most gripping thriller you’ll ever read” is making some statement and despite not wanting to like this book because of its arrogant strapline I did rather like it. It was fast-paced, gritty, shocking and absurd in places which are all the elements you want for a gripping thriller (God I hate myself for saying that!!) 😉
The book flips back and forth between the present day and Max’s efforts to find Erica and Erica’s experiences as an aid worker in Africa during the 1990s which are through diary entries (you need to be prepared for the story to slip in and out of Erica’s diary within chapters and also that they’re not real diary entries because of the style in which they’re written). As you’re reading you’re trying desperately to find the link between the two and although I had my suspicions I was wrong…again! Be aware there are several scenes of torture on male and female victims which some readers may not like.
Is it amazing writing and going to win awards? No. Is it a good piece of entertainment that you lose yourself in for a few hours…yes! Reminds me of the movie Outbreak with Dustin Hoffman.
General book club consensus was 2 liked it (includes me, and both of us read it in 2 days), 2 struggled with characters and some of the absurdity and never really got into it, and 1 sat on the fence 🙂
My overall feeling is that it was a good read, and will be a book that people pick up so can they prove the author wrong for claiming it’s “the most gripping thriller you’ll ever read” but actually, they just might like it.
Connect with the author Nick Louth
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