Book Review: Moment of Madness

Reviewed By: Luke Croll - RAM

Moment of Madness     Amazon UK HC
Una-Mary Parker
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Romantic Suspense
Headline; 2001; £17.99 (English pounds); pp 282
Classification: Adult fiction (thriller)

Professor Miles Scott-Forbes dies, leaving a straightforward will as far as his sons are concerned. However, for daughter Lucinda, he has created a treasure hunt in order for her to get her inheritance. At the centre of the mystery are six pieces of jewellery - five must be passed on, the other is incredibly valuable. However, Lucinda cannot have the jewellery valued. Will she be able to solve the mystery?

Una-Mary Parker mixes romance with suspense and usually can be relied upon to write a well-crafted novel. However, although this was as readable as normal, it seemed weaker than her normal works. For starters, her grip on dialogue has weakened and she seemed unable to recreate authentic children's dialogue, which although not a big problem, kept jarring my reading.

In addition, the quest set for Lucinda seemed unbelievable and the identity of one of the mistresses, meant to be the biggest secret of the book was revealed to the reader much too early on. It would have been better to allow the reader to think it over for longer. Of course, the book is very short, which does not permit a lot of plot development, but more could definitely have been done with this plot, as well as some strands that were unnecessary, such as Lucinda's job at d'Aussoire.

If you need something that will not tax your mind in the slightest, this could be worth a read. Other than that, you are likely to be very disappointed.

Luke Croll - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Luke Croll - RAM

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