Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter? by Nicci French
| Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter? by Nicci French | |
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| Category: Crime | |
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Reviewer: Sue Magee
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| Summary: Five-star form from husband-and-wife team Nicci French. A cracking read which I was sorry to finish. Highly recommended. | |
| Buy? Yes | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 544 | Date: February 2024 |
| Publisher: Simon & Schuster | |
| External links: Author's website | |
| ISBN: 978-1398524088 | |
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Charlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened.
Decades later, Etty returns to Glensted to help move her father into a care home. Alec's now in his eighties and has dementia: he often mistakes Etty for her mother and quite a few secrets come unintentionally to light. Greg and his brother, Morgan, decide to do a podcast about Charlotte's disappearance. Then there's a fire and another death.
Essentially, this is a story about three strong women. The first is the titular Charlotte Salter: beautiful, seemingly loved by all and a good mother to her children, particularly her daughter, Etty. The relationship with her husband was problematic and it was only after her disappearance that a suitcase of clothes was found it the family home. It seemed that she was planning to leave and take Etty with her: now Etty is left alone with her father, whom she hates.
Etty - or Elizabeth as she is known in later years - is stronger than she realises. She's a lawyer but nothing in her early life prepared her for personal relationships. The Glensted police subject her to misogyny and suspicion: nothing much has changed in the thirty years since her mother's disappearance.
The third strong woman is Detective Inspector Maud O'Connor, parachuted in to take over the investigation after the fire and death. Someone 'disposable' was needed when the current incumbent proved particularly inept and women in middle-ranking positions in any organisation usually qualify under that heading. Her personal life might be in turmoil, but she won't let this investigation - or the local police force - get the better of her. I would love to hear more about Maud O'Connor.
I came quite late to the husband-and-wife team Nicci French but I was hooked once I made the discovery. I think this might well be their best yet and I found it almost impossible to put down before I found out what happened to Charlotte Salter. The ending is particularly satisfying. As well as reading the book, I listened to an audio download (which I bought myself) narrated by Jane Collingwood. Collingwood has an excellent range of voices and I was never in any doubt about which character I was listening to. The pacing is perfect and she never intrudes between the author and the reader. I would gladly listen to more from her.
The last book by French that I read was The Favour and I didn't feel that it was one of their best. I'm glad that they're back on five-star form with this latest book.
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