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A review by ellelainey
The Dark Side of the Road: A Country House Murder Mystery with a Supernatural Twist by Simon R. Green
4.0
The Dark Side of the Road, by Simon R. Green
Ishmael Jones, 01
★★★★☆
224 Pages
1st person, single character POV
Themes: murder, science fiction, vampires, aliens, secret organisations, forced proximity
Triggers: mentions of gore, violence and supernatural beings
Genre: Contemporary, Murder Mystery, Science Fiction, Crime
~
The Dark Side of the Road is the first book in the Ishmael Jones series – a series and author who are new-to-me. I was intrigued by the blurb and approved for some of the other books in the series by Netgalley, so I had high hopes it would all work out.
Now I'm done, I'm not really sure where to start...I don't know how to categorise the book except as some blend of Murder Mystery and Sci-Fi. I think if it wasn't for that confusion between the two I might be standing on firmer footing right now, trying to write down my thoughts. The blend was...jarring.
I don't want to go into too much detail about the plot because it's better to find out yourself. If I explained it you probably wouldn't believe me.
The story takes place in modern days, with Ishmael Jones – a “non human” (we find out what at around 25%) attached to a secret organisation as their clean-up crew and handyman. He gets a strange phone call from his boss, the Colonel. The Colonel is at home for Christmas with his family, but there's something unnatural going on that he needs Ishmael's help with. However, by the time Ishmael drives from London to the manor in a snow storm, the Colonel is nowhere to be found!
Sounds good, right?
Well, it would have been even better without those ENDLESS pages upon pages of weather description as Ishmael drove through the storm. I seriously feel like more than 20 pages were dedicated to the driving conditions, the snow, the cold, the struggle of the roads. You get the drift. It did give Ishmael plenty of time to reminisce about his past with the Colonel, which at least gave us some background info on the two characters, which was important. However, it really could have been cleaner and not so long-winded.
Normally, because I'm Scottish and talk like it, I don't mind a bit of winding navigation or long-windedness but this was a little excessive even for me. The entire story suffered from the same problem – either due to spending too long spent on other things than what was important in the moment or by waxing lyrical in description about things that really didn't matter. It took 40% for the first body to appear and that felt like a REALLY long time, by the time we got there. I felt like this book was well over 300 pages, from how long it took to read it and what a slog it felt to get past all the extraneous information.
Saying that...I really did enjoy the journey. Ishmael is an interesting character and I enjoyed the Agatha Christie-esque setting and plot. I won't go too far into it, but it STRONGLY reminded me of the 1965 movie adaptation of Ten Little Indians. Throw in some paranormal/supernatural elements and you've got my interest, for sure. But it's also a little like Midsomer Murders in that there's never just one body.
I liked how we gradually got to learn a little more about Ishmael as a person – even if sometimes it was dumped into our laps in huge swathes of information – and how what and who he was added some extra elements of believability to what he was capable of. It also nicely set up the concept that he was the best man for the job, even if no one believed it. The secret organisation he works for also left a handy Out for how to deal with the extremely bloody mess left behind at the end. The fact that Ishmael is ageless and has been around since the early 60's also adds an extra element of interest to the plot, because – as we see in this book – bumping into old pals or acquaintances is a hazard of long life.
As for characters, I feel that although we only ever got Ishmael's POV that was fine. I still got a clear enough picture of who everyone was, their little tics and personality quirks, to try to put the pieces together on my own. I feel I came to the right conclusion early, but there were so many plot twists and possibilities (in a good way!) that I was left doubting and second-guessing myself until the end.
There's quite the motley crew gathered for this Christmas get-together:
James – or the Colonel as Ishmael knew him – is the son of Walter and it's his family home they're gathered at. Walter's first wife, and James' mother, Diana is in residence along with his new wife, Melanie and her daughter by Walter, Penny. It's a long and winding road through their family tree, for sure!
Next, we have the guests: Sylvia is a companion to Diana, in the old-fashioned meaning of a friend; Alex Khan is a business partner to Walter; and Roger is the recently spurned ex-fiance of Penny.
There are also two members of staff: Jeeves the butler (though he admits that's not really his name!) and the cook, Leilah.
Interesting, we discover that two of the guests are actually connected to Ishmael's past, when he went by another name, and because of the fact he doesn't age they all believe that person to be his father or grandfather, not him.
~
Overall, I really enjoyed the mystery aspect, the connections between people and how it all was revealed at the end. Ishmael was a really interesting character with some extraordinary abilities that were great to read about and really helped him solve the mystery. On the downside, I did feel that Ishmael often stood motionless at times when he really should have been doing something with his abilities. There were at least 2 times when he could have saved someone's life but instead just stood there looking like a coat-rack. I also wasn't sure the last minute romance was necessary, though I liked her character enough to be glad she'll probably be in future books.
I will definitely read the next book, and I'm looking forward to exploring more of Ishmael's past and abilities, and seeing whether this relationship will pan out or fizzle.
Ishmael Jones, 01
★★★★☆
224 Pages
1st person, single character POV
Themes: murder, science fiction, vampires, aliens, secret organisations, forced proximity
Triggers: mentions of gore, violence and supernatural beings
Genre: Contemporary, Murder Mystery, Science Fiction, Crime
~
The Dark Side of the Road is the first book in the Ishmael Jones series – a series and author who are new-to-me. I was intrigued by the blurb and approved for some of the other books in the series by Netgalley, so I had high hopes it would all work out.
Now I'm done, I'm not really sure where to start...I don't know how to categorise the book except as some blend of Murder Mystery and Sci-Fi. I think if it wasn't for that confusion between the two I might be standing on firmer footing right now, trying to write down my thoughts. The blend was...jarring.
I don't want to go into too much detail about the plot because it's better to find out yourself. If I explained it you probably wouldn't believe me.
The story takes place in modern days, with Ishmael Jones – a “non human” (we find out what at around 25%) attached to a secret organisation as their clean-up crew and handyman. He gets a strange phone call from his boss, the Colonel. The Colonel is at home for Christmas with his family, but there's something unnatural going on that he needs Ishmael's help with. However, by the time Ishmael drives from London to the manor in a snow storm, the Colonel is nowhere to be found!
Sounds good, right?
Well, it would have been even better without those ENDLESS pages upon pages of weather description as Ishmael drove through the storm. I seriously feel like more than 20 pages were dedicated to the driving conditions, the snow, the cold, the struggle of the roads. You get the drift. It did give Ishmael plenty of time to reminisce about his past with the Colonel, which at least gave us some background info on the two characters, which was important. However, it really could have been cleaner and not so long-winded.
Normally, because I'm Scottish and talk like it, I don't mind a bit of winding navigation or long-windedness but this was a little excessive even for me. The entire story suffered from the same problem – either due to spending too long spent on other things than what was important in the moment or by waxing lyrical in description about things that really didn't matter. It took 40% for the first body to appear and that felt like a REALLY long time, by the time we got there. I felt like this book was well over 300 pages, from how long it took to read it and what a slog it felt to get past all the extraneous information.
Saying that...I really did enjoy the journey. Ishmael is an interesting character and I enjoyed the Agatha Christie-esque setting and plot. I won't go too far into it, but it STRONGLY reminded me of the 1965 movie adaptation of Ten Little Indians. Throw in some paranormal/supernatural elements and you've got my interest, for sure. But it's also a little like Midsomer Murders in that there's never just one body.
I liked how we gradually got to learn a little more about Ishmael as a person – even if sometimes it was dumped into our laps in huge swathes of information – and how what and who he was added some extra elements of believability to what he was capable of. It also nicely set up the concept that he was the best man for the job, even if no one believed it. The secret organisation he works for also left a handy Out for how to deal with the extremely bloody mess left behind at the end. The fact that Ishmael is ageless and has been around since the early 60's also adds an extra element of interest to the plot, because – as we see in this book – bumping into old pals or acquaintances is a hazard of long life.
As for characters, I feel that although we only ever got Ishmael's POV that was fine. I still got a clear enough picture of who everyone was, their little tics and personality quirks, to try to put the pieces together on my own. I feel I came to the right conclusion early, but there were so many plot twists and possibilities (in a good way!) that I was left doubting and second-guessing myself until the end.
There's quite the motley crew gathered for this Christmas get-together:
James – or the Colonel as Ishmael knew him – is the son of Walter and it's his family home they're gathered at. Walter's first wife, and James' mother, Diana is in residence along with his new wife, Melanie and her daughter by Walter, Penny. It's a long and winding road through their family tree, for sure!
Next, we have the guests: Sylvia is a companion to Diana, in the old-fashioned meaning of a friend; Alex Khan is a business partner to Walter; and Roger is the recently spurned ex-fiance of Penny.
There are also two members of staff: Jeeves the butler (though he admits that's not really his name!) and the cook, Leilah.
Interesting, we discover that two of the guests are actually connected to Ishmael's past, when he went by another name, and because of the fact he doesn't age they all believe that person to be his father or grandfather, not him.
~
Overall, I really enjoyed the mystery aspect, the connections between people and how it all was revealed at the end. Ishmael was a really interesting character with some extraordinary abilities that were great to read about and really helped him solve the mystery. On the downside, I did feel that Ishmael often stood motionless at times when he really should have been doing something with his abilities. There were at least 2 times when he could have saved someone's life but instead just stood there looking like a coat-rack. I also wasn't sure the last minute romance was necessary, though I liked her character enough to be glad she'll probably be in future books.
I will definitely read the next book, and I'm looking forward to exploring more of Ishmael's past and abilities, and seeing whether this relationship will pan out or fizzle.