Author: Carlene O'Connor
Genre: Mystery
Hardcover; Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN #: 9781496737526; 9781496737533
Kensington Books
336 Pages
$18.47; $16.95; $13.49 Amazon
October 25, 2022
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On a rocky beach in the southwest of Ireland, the body of a wealthy racehorse owner Johnny O'Reilly has been discovered. In a town like Dingle, everyone knows a little something about everyone else. But dig a bit deeper, and there's always much more to find. And when Detective Inspector Cormac O'Brien is dispatched out of Killarney to lead the murder inquiry, he's determined to unearth every last buried secret.
Dimpna Wilde hasn't been home in years. But faced with a triple bombshell -- her mother is rumored to have been in a relationship with Johnny, her father's dementia is escalating, and her brother is avoiding her calls -- Dimpna moves back to Dingle to clear her family of suspicion. And as she takes over the family practice, she finds herself in a race with the detective inspector to uncover the dark, twisting truth behind the murder, no matter how close to home it strikes...
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Dr. Dimpna Wilde is a veterinarian just like her father. She's had tragedy in her life, including the fact that her husband killed himself after a public scandal. But when she learns that in her hometown of Dingle, where she hasn't been for decades, there's been a murder of a man she knows well and that one of her parents is suspected of the killing, she packs up her menagerie of pets and goes home.
What she finds distresses her -- her father is in the stages of dementia and his practice is falling apart, and her mother now reads the Tarot to locals. Her brother won't return her calls, and her son Ben is telling her he's in Spain with a new girlfriend. But the worst thing is she's come fact-to-face with the son of the dead man -- she's hated him forever and now his mother is throwing the accusations on her family. Dimpna decides to do the only thing she can: find the murderer before the new inspector in town makes a terrible mistake. But what will the cost be to her and her loved ones?...
This is the first book in a new series by Ms. O'Connor. As I love her other series, I wanted to read this, even though it was listed as a "dark cozy." It is not. Although foul language doesn't offend me, there is quite a bit of it in this book which exempts it from being a true cozy. Just throwing that out there, folks.
The plot is rather convoluted, and every character (save the inspector and the other garda) has a connection, tenuous or not, to each other. Each little thread pulls them closer together, and it gives out terrible secrets, lies, and betrayals. Dimpna's latest tragedy connects to one that occurred twenty-seven years ago, and it becomes the focus of the book. It is rather sad, terribly horrid, and there are more secrets to come.
I had a difficult time reading this book. Mainly because it was rather boring and halfway through, I nearly didn't finish it. But I wanted to find the outcome, so I plodded forward. Unfortunately, this book didn't enchant nor enthrall me whatsoever. Everything seemed to come down to one thing, and the terrible part is that I couldn't connect with any of the characters. Dimpna has practically no personality, and we aren't given much to go on regarding the others. While I will give Ms. O'Connor the benefit of the doubt as to creating new characters, I hope that everything goes better in the next book.
I won a copy of this book but it in no way influenced my review.
More on Carlene O'Connor's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/o/carlene-oconnor/
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