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katykelly's review against another edition
3.0
Murderer/thriller story with some interesting aspects.
3.5 stars.
A man is abducting young women, threatening them with harm and then making them call their mothers. At first nobody is hurt... but that changes...
This is happening in the seaside town where Ruby lives. Close to her father and resentful of her mother who she sees as causing all her parents' problems, Ruby is glad when her father suggests she help him track down the killer.
Told from Ruby's point of view on the whole, we also see the killer and his victims, and are given insights that the other characters aren't aware of, quite early on, ratcheting up the tension of just what this means for the protagonists.
I quite enjoyed listening to this, it's a genre that works on audiobook with the first person perspective and constantly-moving plot. But in some respects it's also formulaic - motivations and a not-too-memorable denouément.
Some interesting elements, but not a standout for me.
3.5 stars.
A man is abducting young women, threatening them with harm and then making them call their mothers. At first nobody is hurt... but that changes...
This is happening in the seaside town where Ruby lives. Close to her father and resentful of her mother who she sees as causing all her parents' problems, Ruby is glad when her father suggests she help him track down the killer.
Told from Ruby's point of view on the whole, we also see the killer and his victims, and are given insights that the other characters aren't aware of, quite early on, ratcheting up the tension of just what this means for the protagonists.
I quite enjoyed listening to this, it's a genre that works on audiobook with the first person perspective and constantly-moving plot. But in some respects it's also formulaic - motivations and a not-too-memorable denouément.
Some interesting elements, but not a standout for me.
sandin954's review against another edition
5.0
Set in a rural village in North Devon that is slowing falling back into the sea, this had a tense and creepy plot, unique characters, and great pacing and flow.
fictionfan's review against another edition
5.0
Daddy's gone a-huntin'...
Little Ruby Trick lives with her parents in a broken-down cottage called The Retreat in the tiny village of Limeburn in Devon. With the forest encroaching on one side and the sea threatening on the other, Limeburn is not the idyllic English village of fiction. This is a rain-soaked, muddy place, barely putting up a fight any longer against the forces of nature that are slowly crushing it into extinction. And Ruby’s family is under as much threat as her home – with Daddy long out of work and no longer making much effort to do anything about it, while Mummy works full time and worries about money and Ruby’s welfare. Daddy’s much more fun, though – he’s a part-time cowboy in the local Gunslingers club and spoils plump little Ruby with Mars Bars and chips. So Ruby always takes Daddy’s side against Mummy and would do anything to keep his love. Including helping him hunt a serial killer…
This book starts off slowly by introducing us to Ruby’s life. The descriptions of the village and its life are vivid and extremely topical given the amount of rain and flood damage the country has been suffering recently for real. And the constant threat of natural disaster combines with the isolation of the village to provide a nicely chilling backdrop for a story that suddenly darkens into something much more disturbing than the first few chapters might suggest. Because somewhere in this area of Devon, a man is beginning on a course of action that will eventually turn him into a serial killer; as the tagline says - every killer has to start somewhere. And this killer starts by abducting a young woman, then forcing her to phone her mother and tell her goodbye. As the attacks mount, John Trick and his fellow Gunslingers decide to hunt down the killer themselves, and Ruby gets the chance to join their ‘posse’…
Bauer has given us an original twist on the serial killer novel and writes with all her usual skill. The main adult characters are very well developed – we see them through Ruby’s eyes but Bauer manages to give us enough information so that our interpretation of their actions is different from hers. However I felt the structure of the book wasn’t as tight as Bauer’s plots have been in the past, meaning that most of the surprises were revealed well before the thriller-like ending.
Bauer has given us a child’s eye view in some of her earlier books, and is no less effective in this one in taking us into the mind of 10-year-old Ruby. However, I must admit that I got fairly tired of all the Mummy/Daddy stuff as the book wore on, especially since Bauer mainly kept the language very much at the level of a fairly immature 10-year-old’s. It’s very well done and I admire the skill, but for my personal taste I don’t want to read vast swathes of over-simplified language and the half-understanding that a child’s viewpoint inevitably gives if it is to be convincing. I did also wonder if many of today’s 10-year-olds are quite as naïve as Ruby seems to be.
I feel I’m being hyper-critical of a book that overall I thought was very readable and enjoyed quite a lot. Bauer’s last book Rubbernecker was one of my favourites of last year and I suspect that’s making me judge this one more harshly than I should, because it didn’t quite live up to my perhaps too-high hopes for it. However, that still leaves it as a very good thriller with some novel twists, strong characterisation and a beautifully-evoked setting – so, despite my criticisms, highly recommended. 4½ stars for me, so rounded up.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
Little Ruby Trick lives with her parents in a broken-down cottage called The Retreat in the tiny village of Limeburn in Devon. With the forest encroaching on one side and the sea threatening on the other, Limeburn is not the idyllic English village of fiction. This is a rain-soaked, muddy place, barely putting up a fight any longer against the forces of nature that are slowly crushing it into extinction. And Ruby’s family is under as much threat as her home – with Daddy long out of work and no longer making much effort to do anything about it, while Mummy works full time and worries about money and Ruby’s welfare. Daddy’s much more fun, though – he’s a part-time cowboy in the local Gunslingers club and spoils plump little Ruby with Mars Bars and chips. So Ruby always takes Daddy’s side against Mummy and would do anything to keep his love. Including helping him hunt a serial killer…
By day, it was easy to forget that the trees and the ocean were lying in wait…But by night Ruby could feel the tides tugging at her belly, while the forest tested The Retreat, squealing against the glass and tapping on the tiles.
And she wondered what it would be like – when the outside finally broke in.
This book starts off slowly by introducing us to Ruby’s life. The descriptions of the village and its life are vivid and extremely topical given the amount of rain and flood damage the country has been suffering recently for real. And the constant threat of natural disaster combines with the isolation of the village to provide a nicely chilling backdrop for a story that suddenly darkens into something much more disturbing than the first few chapters might suggest. Because somewhere in this area of Devon, a man is beginning on a course of action that will eventually turn him into a serial killer; as the tagline says - every killer has to start somewhere. And this killer starts by abducting a young woman, then forcing her to phone her mother and tell her goodbye. As the attacks mount, John Trick and his fellow Gunslingers decide to hunt down the killer themselves, and Ruby gets the chance to join their ‘posse’…
Bauer has given us an original twist on the serial killer novel and writes with all her usual skill. The main adult characters are very well developed – we see them through Ruby’s eyes but Bauer manages to give us enough information so that our interpretation of their actions is different from hers. However I felt the structure of the book wasn’t as tight as Bauer’s plots have been in the past, meaning that most of the surprises were revealed well before the thriller-like ending.
Bauer has given us a child’s eye view in some of her earlier books, and is no less effective in this one in taking us into the mind of 10-year-old Ruby. However, I must admit that I got fairly tired of all the Mummy/Daddy stuff as the book wore on, especially since Bauer mainly kept the language very much at the level of a fairly immature 10-year-old’s. It’s very well done and I admire the skill, but for my personal taste I don’t want to read vast swathes of over-simplified language and the half-understanding that a child’s viewpoint inevitably gives if it is to be convincing. I did also wonder if many of today’s 10-year-olds are quite as naïve as Ruby seems to be.
I feel I’m being hyper-critical of a book that overall I thought was very readable and enjoyed quite a lot. Bauer’s last book Rubbernecker was one of my favourites of last year and I suspect that’s making me judge this one more harshly than I should, because it didn’t quite live up to my perhaps too-high hopes for it. However, that still leaves it as a very good thriller with some novel twists, strong characterisation and a beautifully-evoked setting – so, despite my criticisms, highly recommended. 4½ stars for me, so rounded up.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
lindsaymay92's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
lottevanderpaelt's review
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
mariekealkema's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
anniepickering's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
alexauthorshay's review against another edition
4.0
Not as happy with this book as I have been with some of Bauer's other books. Still a really good read and very demented, but not as twisted and unexpected as some of her other books. I figured out the killer so early on I spent most of the book thinking I must be wrong. About 2/3 of the way through it gets revealed for sure, so I was waiting for a twist that never really came. The ending is close to but not quite deus ex machina, disappointing. But it wasn't so totally out of the blue that it didn't work.
I really liked Ruby as a character. She was my favorite. John Trick was my second favorite, despite what transpires through the course of the novel. I lost a little of my love for him from those events though. I also enjoyed DC Calvin, he was amusing if a bit dense. But I did not like DC King. At all. There's one point in the novel where she says, as they're trying to figure out the motive of the killer, that the motive will end up being textbook, something to do with the killer's mother if not something sexual. Having read Bauer before, I was expecting something NOT like that, but that's exactly what it ended up being. Granted, you have to piece the background to it together yourself, but it ends up being pretty standard and that was the most disappointing thing of all. I would have given this 5 stars except that Bauer ended up making another cardboard cutout killer like most mystery writers I've encountered in my life. His traits early on in the book make it easy to link him to the murders later, which was how I found out who it was so early and hoped I was wrong. Not that the choice for killer makes no sense, just that it's not very exciting or original.
I did like how Bauer wrote Limeburn. The town seems to have a life of its own, the sea constantly trying to 'claim' its land back, the weather gradually wearing down the houses. Bauer gives the perfect small-town-no-secrets vibe, and having a killer suddenly in their midst would obviously have a humongous effect on the townspeople, portrayed through the local Gunslingers group. But here again, a connection is made so early on that it gives the killer away.
I still found the ending suspenseful, but not as much as if I'd still been in shock from finding out who the killer was. Knowing who he is while the characters don't generally creates a dramatic irony that includes suspense, but I didn't really feel that in this one. I never really wondered how the characters were going to survive, but rather, as the page count dwindled to 25 and less, how Bauer was going to end things. Not un-scary by any means, but given what transpired to lead to it, it felt a bit artificial. Not contrived, but like there was nothing original in the killer's motives to bring them to this point. He was the same as every other, just as DC King said. Which was kind of a let down. Every book is about infidelity now and I'm starting to feel like I'm being bashed over the head with it when I didn't want to go anywhere near it in the first place.
I really liked Ruby as a character. She was my favorite. John Trick was my second favorite, despite what transpires through the course of the novel. I lost a little of my love for him from those events though. I also enjoyed DC Calvin, he was amusing if a bit dense. But I did not like DC King. At all. There's one point in the novel where she says, as they're trying to figure out the motive of the killer, that the motive will end up being textbook, something to do with the killer's mother if not something sexual. Having read Bauer before, I was expecting something NOT like that, but that's exactly what it ended up being. Granted, you have to piece the background to it together yourself, but it ends up being pretty standard and that was the most disappointing thing of all. I would have given this 5 stars except that Bauer ended up making another cardboard cutout killer like most mystery writers I've encountered in my life. His traits early on in the book make it easy to link him to the murders later, which was how I found out who it was so early and hoped I was wrong. Not that the choice for killer makes no sense, just that it's not very exciting or original.
I did like how Bauer wrote Limeburn. The town seems to have a life of its own, the sea constantly trying to 'claim' its land back, the weather gradually wearing down the houses. Bauer gives the perfect small-town-no-secrets vibe, and having a killer suddenly in their midst would obviously have a humongous effect on the townspeople, portrayed through the local Gunslingers group. But here again, a connection is made so early on that it gives the killer away.
I still found the ending suspenseful, but not as much as if I'd still been in shock from finding out who the killer was. Knowing who he is while the characters don't generally creates a dramatic irony that includes suspense, but I didn't really feel that in this one. I never really wondered how the characters were going to survive, but rather, as the page count dwindled to 25 and less, how Bauer was going to end things. Not un-scary by any means, but given what transpired to lead to it, it felt a bit artificial. Not contrived, but like there was nothing original in the killer's motives to bring them to this point. He was the same as every other, just as DC King said. Which was kind of a let down. Every book is about infidelity now and I'm starting to feel like I'm being bashed over the head with it when I didn't want to go anywhere near it in the first place.
fxtrtr's review against another edition
4.0
I enjoyed this book a lot. Half-way in, I figured out who the killer was, however, it didn't take away from the ending.
Ruby Trick is a young, coming of age girl, who adores her daddy and, at times, despises her mommy for making her daddy mad. Her father lost his job at the shipping yard, which forced her mother to seek work. As most families plagued by financial woes, the Tricks tend to fight over money.
When young women in and around their town are murdered, Ruby's daddy takes it upon himself to form a posse to catch the killer. Ruby wants to ride along, but her daddy is hesitant at first and then relents. Ruby will soon learn about the facts of life and death.
Ruby Trick is a young, coming of age girl, who adores her daddy and, at times, despises her mommy for making her daddy mad. Her father lost his job at the shipping yard, which forced her mother to seek work. As most families plagued by financial woes, the Tricks tend to fight over money.
When young women in and around their town are murdered, Ruby's daddy takes it upon himself to form a posse to catch the killer. Ruby wants to ride along, but her daddy is hesitant at first and then relents. Ruby will soon learn about the facts of life and death.