No One Needs To Know

Kevin O’Brien

Kensington Books

Pinnacle

ISBN: 9780786031627

 

Description:

A SECRET WORTH KILLING FOR…

In July 1970, actress Elaina Styles was slain in her rented Seattle mansion along with her husband and their son’s nanny. When the baby’s remains were found buried in a shallow grave close to a hippie commune, police moved in—only to find all its members already dead in a grisly mass suicide.

 

AGAIN…

Now, decades later, a film about the murders is shooting at the mansion. On-set caterer Laurie Trotter ignores gossip that the production is cursed. But then people start dying…

 

AND AGAIN…

As Laurie digs deep into what happened all those years ago, the truth emerges more twisted than any whispered rumor, as a legacy of brutal vengeance reaches its terrifying climax.

 

 

 

My View:

The Pros – Scarily atmospheric – the sense of impeding violence and bullying was real and pulse raising. The night I read this I was home alone, well almost alone, I had two dogs with me, if not for their company and protection if need be, I would have stopped reading this book and left it for the daylight hours…in places this was creepy.

The intro was superb providing a great emotional hook – a mothers worst fear…

The Cons – This narrative was complicated with back stories that became precursors to main events, at times it felt like this was three stories badly meshing together trying to flow as one. I don’t think my understanding of the multiple plot lines was assisted by reading this book in a pdf format on my ereader. I usually enlarge the font when I reading a novel on my ereader – this seems to then through all the page breaks/chapter breaks out the window and I think this lead to confusion on more than one occasion – where for example I was hearing the voice/story of one character and the next line was immediately in the view point of someone else – without a pause or obvious or break, very confusing…I found myself re reading pages often trying to work out what was happening. I also thought the narrative could have been more effective told with fewer words. I also had trouble suspending my disbelief on a few occasions.

 

Overall – I think if I had read this narrative in the shape of a physical book my understanding and therefore my enjoyment of the complex plot would have been greater. Kevin O’Brien excels in creating spooky atmosphere and psychological suspense and tension.