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What Was Lost by Catherine O'Flynn (view source)
Revision as of 15:24, 23 August 2020
, 15:24, 23 August 2020no edit summary
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Kurt, a security guard at the Green Oaks shopping centre, sees the shadowy figure of a young girl on the CCTV cameras and it puts him in mind of Kate Meaney who disappeared without a trace twenty years before. With the help of Lisa, a deputy manager at 'Your Music' he searches the endless service corridors, and fails to find her, but over time a relationship grows between Kurt and Lisa.
That sounds rather dull and commonplace, doesn't it? Well, this book is anything but and I loved it. Kate Meaney is a feisty young girl, who's had a lot to contend with in her life. Orphaned after the sudden death of her father she found herself being cared for by her grandmother. It was a loveless relationship and Kate threw herself into her self-appointed job of junior detective and proprietor of the Falcon Detective Agency. Crime, she felt, was all around her and needed to be stamped out and she would be vigilant.
My only reservation about the book was the presence of the 'mystery shopper' which felt superfluous on occasions although the part did help to highlight the unhealthy predominance which shopping has in our lives, when people go to a shopping centre for a day out. Catherine O'Flynn's background has been well-mined for this book – she was brought up in a sweet shop, worked as a mystery shopper and in a record shop. I'll be interested to see how she fares with her next novel when she will have to branch out a little.
If you enjoyed this book then you might also enjoy [[A Small Part of Me]] by Noelle Harrisonor [[We All Begin As Strangers by Harriet Cummings]].
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