I was excited when Carys Jones
asked me to review her new book, Prime Deception, as I have really been in the
mood lately for suspenseful mysteries. However, it turned out that there wasn’t
much suspense and I didn’t feel like there was a huge mystery either.
Most of the story is told from the
point of view of Charles Lloyd, the Deputy Prime Minister of England. It all
begins surrounding his sadness and guilt after he found out his mistress,
Lorna, killed herself by driving into a tree. What he doesn’t find out, though,
is that the day she died she was going to sell the story of their hot and
steamy affair to a local tabloid paper for lots of cash.
Instead of trying to figure out the
crime and solve the mystery, it turns out that most of the plot dwelled on the
feelings and thoughts of the characters, which proved to be somewhat repetitive
after awhile. While I did appreciate how the author allowed the reader to
understand what each character was thinking and feeling instead of it being
just from one point of view, there are only so many ways you can describe how
unhappy Charles was in his marriage or how much he loved and missed Lorna after
her death.
I was hopeful when Lorna’s twin
sister, Laurie, came into the picture as I felt this would give us a respite
from Charles’ unhappiness and shake things up. Laurie was convinced that her twin
would never commit suicide and needed Charles’ help to uncover the crime. The
excitement I was waiting for, however, never came as the plot once again
focused on how sad Laurie was and how much she missed Lorna.
A large chunk of the middle of the
story involved details about Charles’ declining relationship with his wife,
Elaine, and basically how unhappy he was with his marriage. After hearing the
same thing over and over, I began to lack sympathy for him as it seemed he felt
his affair was justified because he married his wife for political reasons
instead of love. Boo-hoo. Get a divorce.
Finally, the last 30 pages popped
up with mystery and intrigue, BUT they ended all too quickly. I felt like for
the amount of build-up involved in solving the mystery and figuring it all out
that everything was resolved in a couple of pages, which was very disappointing.
I wish the rest of the story had the amount of energy and suspense that the
ending chapters did- it would have made it much more of a thriller!
Overall, I feel like Carys
definitely had the talent and writing capabilities to provide us with a more
exciting and suspenseful mystery book. I feel like this was a mix between
crime, romance, and mystery and it just didn’t work.
-Busy Brunette
