Written by Kerri Maniscalco
Published by Little, Brown & Company
Audrey Rose Wadsworth is a curious lady. While other girls from her age and heritage are knitting and drinking thee, she’s dissecting corpses in secret. Normally no one would accept this, but her uncle has no choice. With a serial killer on the loose, all help is needed. Together with the smart, but arrogant Thomas Cresswell, they search for the killer. But what if he’s closer than you expected…
I was so hyped to finally start this series. So many people are fan and the blurb sounded amazing. It’s been a long time since I really read a good whodunnit. I’m a Sherlock fan, so it’s pretty hard to find a good one after that. And this one is definitely not it.
There were definitely quite a few things good about this book. I loved the writing, it was gorgeous and really befitting of the story. Audrey was a character I really loved. Beautiful and feminine, but also curious and powerful. I really enjoyed her. Except for any interaction with Thomas Cresswell.
I heard so many stories of people loving him, but he was anything but interesting. Such a typical self centered, arrogant and irritating guy. Even Sherlock himself has more charms than this guy has. And Audrey, powerful woman as she is, had many situations where she almost changed in one of those giggly girls around him. He had a few good scenes, but overall, I really did not like him.
But the thing I was most dissatisfied with, was the culprit. I won’t spoil anything, but for me it was obvious who it was at 10% of the book. There was one culprit everyone was looking at, and it was so obviously that that wasn’t him, that I just wanted to skip all those parts. Which was like, half of the book.
The reasoning of the deeds was pretty interesting, that I did not expect. But there were still so many loose ends. Like, you know why the culprit killed the women, but there was a terrible explanation about why it was so gruesome. It didn’t make any sense.
The writing was so beautiful that I did like to read the book and Audrey is one of those characters I absolutely love. But Thomas? I don’t know at áll why people love him. But oh well, maybe it’s good we all got different tastes 😉. I don’t think I’ll read the second book anytime soon, but I did like the storyline. Let’s hope that the culprit keeps itself hidden a bit more this time.
5/10