A review by lorrainelowereads
Kind of Cruel by Sophie Hannah

2.0

My latest read absolutely epitomises why I don’t read much in the way of crime. There was a totally engrossing and intriguing plot, a seemingly impossible mystery and several secrets to uncover, including one biggie. I couldn’t put it down. But then when the ‘big secret’ was revealed it was an absolute non-event; we were given the impression is would be life shattering for the main character (Amber) if the secret ever came out, but in the end it was actually so straight forward and had no bearing on her life at all - a total let down. Then the motive at the end for the two murders in the book was so absurd, even given the murderer’s ‘narcissistic personality disorder’. Lastly, we were meant to believe that a relative of one of the police detectives on the case solved the mystery of the link between the two murders with a couple of phone calls, something two police forces hadn’t been able to establish. So an absolutely fascinating plot disintegrates into implausibilities and ridiculousness. I nearly made my eyes bleed for this! On the plus side I really liked Amber and it was a well structured book with loads of really interesting psychoanalysis.