I’ve always kind of liked a good thriller, now and
then. Once upon a time, actually, I’d
read little else, kind of addicted to the thudthudthud of
my chest as I turned pages in a hurry, devouring words and holding my breath,
safe in the confines of my own home.
These days I read a lot less of the old thriller; I have to
be in the mood for a book that gives me that familiar panicky feeling, for
twists and turns that leave me gasping.
I must’ve been in that kind of a mood then, this week,
because I couldn’t put Colette Mcbeth’s The Life I Left Behind down.
On the whole, it was a riveting read, and the last 15 percent or so (I read
this on my Kindle) had me turning the pages like a crazy person; that thudthudthud I mentioned? The climax of this book gave me that
feeling in spades. The premise is interesting, the characters – for the most
part at least – vivid and well crafted, and the whole thing unravels at that
sort of pace that keeps you on the edge of your seat, skipping meals and
frantically speed-reading towards a conclusion that really is pretty damn
satisfying.
This is the story of two crimes and interestingly, the
narrative of the novel is split between three main characters – Melody, the
victim of an attack 6 years ago that left her in a coma and now suffering from
poorly disguised PTSD; Eve, who has just been killed – crime number two -
possibly by the same person who attacked Melody years ago (yep, we’re hearing
from a dead person here, which in and of itself is a pretty neat twist and
works better than you might imagine) and Victoria, a police officer who worked
on Melody’s case and is the lead on Eve’s.
I could have done without Victoria’s POV if I’m honest. There wasn’t
much of it, just a chapter here and a chapter there which meant I didn’t quite
get in her head, and there wasn’t enough of the whole police work (which
usually I love) to hook me in, and so I was reading her chapters and counting
the pages til I was back with Melody (who is rediscovering herself and
reclaiming her life in the wake of Eve’s murder, a clever and interesting arc)
or Eve (who has been investigating Melody’s attack in the wake of the guy who
was convicted being released from prison and who may have been murdered because
of it) both of whom I really liked, for entirely different reasons. Eve is an
interesting narrator, her investigation into Melody’s attack thorough and
intelligent and the way the intricacies of the story are revealed through Eve’s
eyes, either via the research she leaves behind before her murder, or her
recounting of her story alongside the investigation into her own death is
fascinating.
As for Melody, she’s a great example of how a person is not
always all they appear to be on the surface. Melody has an inner strength that
even she didn’t know she had and when everybody – herself included – expects
her to fall apart upon learning the man convicted of attacking her has been
released from prison and is possibly back to his old (murderous) tricks, Melody
does the opposite. What everybody thought would break her actually saves her, kind of, and watching her take back her life made
for a very satisfying read
If I had to pick out a flaw, then I’d go with this: I kind
of wish the secondary characters had been a little more fleshed out,
particularly Melody’s fiancé Sam who seemed to undergo a personality transplant
about a third of the way in that made me blink a little in confusion. The thing
with books like these is that most of the times the supporting cast is just as
important as the protagonist(s) and it can be just a tiny bit frustrating if
you feel like they’re not given much attention until the chapter they star in.
That’s a minor niggle though, because on the whole I really liked this book.
The prologue was excellent and grabbed me from the get go; the clever way in
which the threads of the story are woven together delighted me; and the ending
was exactly how the ending to a good thriller should be.
