This book slowly wove its way into my mind from what I admit was a bit of a slow burn to begin with. You couldn't have prised it out of my hands by halfway through!
I don't even know why I found it hard to lose myself at the beginning, though; I am happy to accept it may be because there was no murdered body to be seen! Anyway, for whatever reason that barrier was up and so I was a bit annoyed by what I perceived as Rachel's incessant nagging and questioning of Jack, and found her doubts just a little bit over the top. Whilst I did mostly brush this aside further in, I will admit to it rearing its head a couple of times throughout, and I did ultimately think that Rachel was prone to being a bit intense. I could understand why though and I did accept it as just her character, but even so I did sometimes wish or will her to relax a little bit. It is fair to say though that her nagging doubts did filter through to me, and because I found the whole Jack mystery very intriguing, it in turn kept me hooked right until the last page.
I thought the way that Rachel's own secret played alongside Jack's quite a clever tool, raising as it did the question of how much we ever truly share with other people. Plus of course the obvious similarities between the two entirely different scenarios surrounding the question of culpability; they both definitely made me examine my own thoughts and morals on each of the secret events.
The gradual feeding through of details and switching of timeframes meant that I wanted to keep reading just one more chapter constantly, but also meant that the story remained shrouded in the mystery until the end. The sense of things being forcibly rushed by the appearance of Wally on the scene was further heightened by the rushing between Newcastle and Oban; I just couldn't settle.
Ultimately though this was just a jolly good read. A totally engrossing mystery which was always calling out to be solved. Great.
