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3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Much better the The Dry. Falk didn't seem so bland this time. Fast moving mystery.
I liked the narration style, - The present search of Alice and the previous week's story of the women's trek. The Australian bushlands were described beautifully.
Alice and her daughter were both unlikeable. I was thinking why bother searching for her at all.
Detective Carmen was another irritating character. When she was grilling her fellow officer, Falk about his private life (which had nothing to do with the official investigation), I wanted Falk to tell her to keep her busy nose in her own business.
The repetition of the phrase "Get the contracts " was grating. We understand how important getting the contracts was, it did not have to be drilled through.
I had a problem with the corporate retreat setup. I am curious if Jane Harper knows how a corporate environment works. To start with, the team selected for the 'Team building' - the criteria was explained but that didn't explain why a data entry operator who worked in the basement was included. The top honchos never had any interaction with Beth, then why was she part of the 'Team building'.
The trek was not organized well and it was a in extreme weather conditions. No adventure club lets the participants on their own, without a properly marked track and without proper communication channels. Here they were not even given satellite phones. The mobile phones were not allowed. Though there was no signal, they could have at least taken pictures of the beautiful trek path.
They could have carried pre-cooked canned food instead of carrying gas stove, canister, raw materials like rice, ham and expecting them to start a fire a cook.
In these modern times how likely is it for someone to get lost with all grocery available and no phone?
As mentioned in the book, if the intention to see how they survive together as a team (to promote team building) they could have asked them to hunt for food instead of providing groceries and stove.
If I was not nit picking on finer details, I would have enjoyed the book. I might read her other book "Dry", as I liked the writing.
Alice and her daughter were both unlikeable. I was thinking why bother searching for her at all.
Detective Carmen was another irritating character. When she was grilling her fellow officer, Falk about his private life (which had nothing to do with the official investigation), I wanted Falk to tell her to keep her busy nose in her own business.
The repetition of the phrase "Get the contracts " was grating. We understand how important getting the contracts was, it did not have to be drilled through.
I had a problem with the corporate retreat setup. I am curious if Jane Harper knows how a corporate environment works. To start with, the team selected for the 'Team building' - the criteria was explained but that didn't explain why a data entry operator who worked in the basement was included. The top honchos never had any interaction with Beth, then why was she part of the 'Team building'.
The trek was not organized well and it was a in extreme weather conditions. No adventure club lets the participants on their own, without a properly marked track and without proper communication channels. Here they were not even given satellite phones. The mobile phones were not allowed. Though there was no signal, they could have at least taken pictures of the beautiful trek path.
They could have carried pre-cooked canned food instead of carrying gas stove, canister, raw materials like rice, ham and expecting them to start a fire a cook.
In these modern times how likely is it for someone to get lost with all grocery available and no phone?
As mentioned in the book, if the intention to see how they survive together as a team (to promote team building) they could have asked them to hunt for food instead of providing groceries and stove.
If I was not nit picking on finer details, I would have enjoyed the book. I might read her other book "Dry", as I liked the writing.
Admittedly, I have not read The Dry yet (still on the library’s wait list), but Force of Nature was promoted as a stand-alone book. While the plot itself is stand-alone, the investigating characters seemed pretty flat, very little background or development. Of the rest of the characters/suspects, there were so many that I couldn’t full invest in any one of them. I had a hard time for the first half of the book keeping the women straight because other than the twins, they all seemed to overlap. The plot concept is a new one, Harper’s writing is solid, and her build of atmospheric tension was decent, but the lack of character depth made this one fall flat for me. By the time I got to the end I didn’t care how it resolved, so long as it did. I’m still planning to read The Dry, and I’m hopeful I just read these backwards.
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I like the detective. Would like more character development and more police work. Both books have leaned too heavily on writing crutches.
Great reading by Stephen Shanahan. Too bad about the plot failure.
I think I should like this one more than I did. Likely, the narrator of the audio was the main negative. A mysterious disappearance of a woman, in the woods. A bit of a thriller. Mostly a plodding mystery.
Decent. I’m going to try others by the same author to see if I like them more.
Decent. I’m going to try others by the same author to see if I like them more.
3.5 stars. Five women go on a corporate retreat for a bonding experience in the Australian back woods. Four stagger out. Alice doesn’t come back and all the other women have reason to have killed her, but this is Australia, and that itself can kill you. What happened to Alice? Did she get lost? Or did she get murdered?