This book, despite its violent premise and tough scenes, is a compelling read thanks to Atkinson's dark sense of humour which alleviates the tone. I really enjoyed the strong female leads and their unique personalities that did not rely on quirks as is often the case in detective fiction. Although it seems to be part of a series, it's fine to read as a standalone, although I'm now definitely curious to read more in the same vein.
A very original and addictive read. ( )

So bad, no badly narrated, that I had to give up. ( )

What I'm enjoying the most about this series is Jackson Brodie, wondering what incarnation he will take this time. I'm also frustrated and sort of disappointed in Jackson, because it seems like no matter what he does, misfortune just follows him. Maybe I feel like I can relate, a little. But in this case, the book's title is very fitting, because once again Jackson and the people in his orbit are magnets for bad shit happening. The characters here include a woman who has grown up into a functioning human after surviving an attack as a child that killed most of the rest of her family, and a girl who seems to be surrounded by death. There is also Louise, whose unfulfilled flirtation with Jackson drives both of them to distraction, despite both having ostensibly moved on from it. All these threads are brought together, in Atkinson's now-familiar narrative style, by a huge, life-changing event. "Everywhere you looked there was unfinished business and unanswered questions," Jackson muses near the end, and for the first time in this series I find myself wanting to move right into the next installment. But since it also appears to be the last (for now), I'll pace myself and stretch it out a little. ( )

Not what you might expect, being part in the series. Without giving too much away, I just say that Jackson Brodie is not in the centre of the action, although, at the same time, he kind of is. I like Atkinson's way of building characters and making use of coincidences, the same goes for this one as well. I enjoyed this! ( )

This is going to be difficult to discuss without spoilers, so go ahead and assume this is spoilerville.
There are a number of different strands of story here and you wonder how they will come together - and the ending still leaves you with almost more questions as answers.
It starts with a murder of a mother and 2 of her 3 children, the third escapes and runs off. Joanna survives and we pick up her story some 30 years later when she is a GP in Scotland and has a baby of her own. Her family's killer, Andrew Decker, was brought to justice and is now about to be released from prison. The police come to tell Joanna about this, so that she is aware that the press may be on her trail. The police also visit the Hunter's house to talk to Neil, Joanna's husband, about a fire in a casino that he owns that is viewed as suspicious. Into the mix we add Reggie Chase, who is pretty much alone in the world, her father never having been around and her mother died in a holiday accident. Reggie has a good for nothing brother Billy and she happens to work for Joanna Hunter as "mother's help". Reggie is also being schooled by a retired school mistress with a brain tumour that's about to kill her. Into this set of disparate characters we add Jackson Brodie and Louise Munroe, a pair that have had a history and gone their separate ways. Jackson's story seems separate from the others until he ends up in Scotland as well and gets tied up with Joanna's family killer and has his life saved by Reggie.
Its a story that runs along at quite a pace, with Reggie's boundless energy and ability to bounce back from disaster after disaster seemingly driving the story forward. She's the one that insists that there is something unusual in Joanna's absence and that the ill aunt is not the whole story. While she is disbelieved, she turns out to be right on the nose more often than not. The focus of the story shifts every chapter or two, with different characters being the focus and so the story doesn't always seem to run purely chronologically, sometimes feels lie we go back & catch up on someone. Joanna is more the still centre on which the story revolves, in her words, just because something dreadful happened once, doesn't mean something dreadful can't happen again. And so the way she manages to rescue herself is both shocking in its violence and somehow not at all out of character of this extraordinarily capable woman. The ending, and especially what happens to Decker, leaves you wondering what exactly she did or didn't do and why he was on that train to Scotland.
I listened to this. I'm aware that it is the third in the Jackson Brodie series, but I'm not sure that this needs to be read in order, it read perfectly well as a standalone novel. ( )