I had high hopes for this book, I loved the first impression and thought the forging angle was a nice twist on the murder mystery genre.
Unfortunately I found the actual story to be less than compelling. It was very put downable, not awful but it didn't grab my attention and I read my way through it over a number of sittings mostly when I looked and saw I hadn't reviewed it yet when reading other things.
Let me start by saying that Brandon Morrows does a lot of small things really well but the overall story doesn't benefit from the clear knowledge and research that he has tried to put into it.
The opening really did impress me and the novel got off to a good start.
However once through the beginning and the scene and character setting bits this story settled into a much slower,duller tone.
I can't deny the author knows a lot about the arts and literary worlds, and a fair deal about forging and dealing which lends real substance to those scenes, which is very interesting and a redeeming feature but so much of the story and Will's droning narration is pointless, or just going over events or feelings that the characters have already expressed.
I felt Brandon Morrows gave the game away as to who was responsible for the crime towards the start, and then spent the middle of the book trying to misdirect the reader and make the lead character into a paranoid wreck who is fixated on forging and loving his partner, whilst a very poorly introduced and explained boogeyman is set up as a pantomime villian.
The amount of pages dedicated to his moral conflicts, love for Meghan and paranoia is a complete waste, and ultimately made this book very put downable and dull.
Atticus was an underused character who felt like he was just there to nudge the plot along and provide some interesting info on books, and Henry Slader never felt like a real person to me - bother of their characters,motivations and reasonings weren't really fleshed out to my satisfaction.
I stuck with it as, as whilst I was pretty sure who dunnit and what the ending would be like, I did actually like the concluding parts and how they were written, but overall this was a very put downable mediocre read.
(I honestly think once the setting moves to Ireland you can pretty much skip to the finale of the book )
Unfortunately I found the actual story to be less than compelling. It was very put downable, not awful but it didn't grab my attention and I read my way through it over a number of sittings mostly when I looked and saw I hadn't reviewed it yet when reading other things.
Let me start by saying that Brandon Morrows does a lot of small things really well but the overall story doesn't benefit from the clear knowledge and research that he has tried to put into it.
The opening really did impress me and the novel got off to a good start.
However once through the beginning and the scene and character setting bits this story settled into a much slower,duller tone.
I can't deny the author knows a lot about the arts and literary worlds, and a fair deal about forging and dealing which lends real substance to those scenes, which is very interesting and a redeeming feature but so much of the story and Will's droning narration is pointless, or just going over events or feelings that the characters have already expressed.
I felt Brandon Morrows gave the game away as to who was responsible for the crime towards the start, and then spent the middle of the book trying to misdirect the reader and make the lead character into a paranoid wreck who is fixated on forging and loving his partner, whilst a very poorly introduced and explained boogeyman is set up as a pantomime villian.
The amount of pages dedicated to his moral conflicts, love for Meghan and paranoia is a complete waste, and ultimately made this book very put downable and dull.
Atticus was an underused character who felt like he was just there to nudge the plot along and provide some interesting info on books, and Henry Slader never felt like a real person to me - bother of their characters,motivations and reasonings weren't really fleshed out to my satisfaction.
I stuck with it as, as whilst I was pretty sure who dunnit and what the ending would be like, I did actually like the concluding parts and how they were written, but overall this was a very put downable mediocre read.
(I honestly think once the setting moves to Ireland you can pretty much skip to the finale of the book )