Thriller

Five Survive

Posted by cat2002116 on August 8, 2024
Posted in: Books, Reviews, Thriller, Young Adult. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I originally started reading this book several months ago, but thanks to how bad one of the main characters was, I ended up putting it down until my oldest nibling told me they’d read it faster than the previous standalone book by Holly Jackson. So then I picked it up again…and finished reading it in less than a day.

I found Red to be a character who was really easy to empathise with and understand. I actually liked most of the characters who were trapped in the RV; except for Oliver, who didn’t seem to have a single redeeming quality to him. I was actually a bit disappointed, given how well developed the other characters were.

I thought Holly Jackson did a really good job of showing the tension and claustraphobia as the six main characters became trapped in the RV by a sniper. I do think that going along with every one of Oliver’s plans was a mistake, especially as he became more and more unhinged as time went on. At the same time, though, I guess no one else tried to step in, so maybe it was understandable.

I really liked seeing Red’s interactions with Arthur, as I thought they were very cute together. I really liked how Arthur bonded with Red by writing his own messages on his hand…and I liked that he constantly checked in with her, as it seemed like none of the others were really doing that; even Maddy, who was supposed to be Red’s best friend.

I do think that the group could have looked at what secret one of them held long before they actually did. Yes, the group was focusing on trying to escape…and assumed the secret was linked to the case being handled by Maddy and Oliver’s mother. However, as soon as it became clear that it wasn’t about Oliver or Maddy, it surprises me that no one thought to start asking about secrets.

I did find myself caring about all of the characters; except for Oliver, really. Yes, all of them had secrets of their own…some connected to the current situation they found themselves in and others that had nothing to do with why the sniper was targeting them. I thought the way those secrets came out were very seamless, and some of them made for very good red herrings. And the ending did manage to surprise me a bit.

All in all, I did really enjoy reading this book. It was quick and easy, and I’m glad I gave it a second chance. If you enjoyed A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, I would recommend giving this book a try too.

Stay Awake

Posted by cat2002116 on August 6, 2024
Posted in: Books, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I actually heard about this book when I watched a YouTube video about horror/scary books that should be made into TV series. The explanation of the plot sounded so intriguing, I was immediately interested and looked up the book on Amazon Kindle. It wasn’t very expensive, so I bought it…and then the YouTuber commented that the book wasn’t all that great, in spite of the interesting premise.

Since books (and movies, TV series, video games, etc.) can be subjective, I decided to give this book a try anyway, and I did find it a really quick, easy read. I will say, however, that it did hit a couple of my dislikes when it comes to books. For instance, there was a huge amount of info dumping in Detective Halliday’s sections of the book…and the book also kept switching between first and third person and present and past tense, which unfortunately made the book a little confusing and hard to follow at times.

A lot of this book made me think of the movie Memento, which this book had a very similar premise to. I did find Liv to be a character who was really easy to relate to and empathise with. Right from the very first scene, when she’s in the cab going back to what she thinks is her apartment, I was able to feel her confusion and disorientation about what was going on. It was clear that she didn’t have any memory of what had happened and why she had a bloodstained knife in her hand, and I could definitely empathise with her confusion and fear as the news reports start talking about the murder scene with the words Stay Awake written in blood at the scene; the same words that Liv has written on her own skin, because every time she falls asleep, her memory resets.

I will say that the constant flashbacks to two years ago made it really hard for me to follow the exact timeline in the present day. Later on in the book, it’s heavily implied that the entire murder investigation took place in a day…and I’m sorry, but that just didn’t feel realistic to me. I know, I know. It’s a book about a person whose memory resets every time she goes to sleep; it’s not exactly realistic. But suspending my disbelief about that was vastly different to suspending my disbelief about two detectives doing so much in less than 24 hours.

While I did find the constant flashbacks to be quite confusing, it was good to learn about what had happened to Liv gradually, as she herself learned about what had happened two years ago. However, I do think there could have been a different, better way of gradually revealing that information, since the constant changes in tense and voice made it difficult to switch focus.

Despite the problems, I did actually enjoy reading this book. It had a really interesting premise, and the main character was someone I really cared about and empathised with. I would be interested in reading more books by this same author in the future, so long as just one style is used when writing!

A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder Season One

Posted by cat2002116 on July 14, 2024
Posted in: Reviews, Television, Thriller, Young Adult. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

So, I really liked the book A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. When my oldest nibling told me that the TV series was available to watch on BBC iPlayer, I was immediately interested in watching it…and I watched all six episodes in one night.

While I did have some mixed feelings about this series, I did like Pip in the series. My sister mentioned that she felt Pip’s autistic traits were more obvious in the TV series than in the books, and I’m inclined to agree…though Ry always felt that Pip was obviously autistic to them in the books.

It’s hard not to compare the series to the book, as it was obviously based on that. I will say that a lot of the actors portrayed the characters they played really well. I’m more used to seeing Matthew Baynton in comedy roles than serious ones, but I did think he did a particularly good job at portraying Elliot Ward.

While the book was always going to be better, I was kind of disappointed that so much was left out of the series. There was a lot of intrigue that wasn’t included…and I really didn’t like the fact that one of the main characters had her entire backstory completely changed (Nat Da Silva). One of the really good things about the book was just how many secrets Andie was revealed to have, showing that she wasn’t the ‘good’ girl everyone had assumed her to be. I can’t really say that there was subject matter the series didn’t want to touch on, either, as it didn’t shy away from showing what had happened to Becca.

I did like the flashbacks to Pip as a child and when she saw Andie for the last time, but I did kind of feel that that particular flashback was shown a lot more than was really necessary. While it was good to gradually know more about that situation (such as Pip telling Sal where Andie was), I didn’t think it needed to be shown as many times as it was.

I mentioned above that I was disappointed in one of the characters having her backstory changed…and I have to say that I didn’t like the way her brother, Daniel, was changed in the series. The series really didn’t need a charming potential love interest (it was a bit weird that Pip called him cute, since he was always angry, and older than her…not to mention married…in the book), especially as the series already had Ravi!

I did like Naomi and Cara and their relationship with each other, as well as their friendship with Pip. I thought that Yasmin Al-Khudhairi did a really good job of capturing Naomi’s personality, along with the guilt that clearly affected her after the car crash and everything that happened with Sal. And I really liked Cara’s interactions with Pip. I can’t really say the same for the rest of Pip’s friends, though. I didn’t feel any real connection to them, as I didn’t feel their characters were developed very much throughout the series…which is a shame, as there were a lot of good things about Pip’s interactions with them in the book.

I did enjoy Pip’s interactions with her father in this series…but I didn’t really like her relationship with her mother as much. Her mother seemed to be trying to parent sometimes, only to be distant and preoccupied later on in the series. Plus, unlike in the book, Pip showed very little sign of her project affecting her in a negative way. Yes, she went out to a party…but her parents seemed entirely on board with her doing that. In that respect, I’d say that the series dropped the ball a little.

I do think that the series stands well enough on its own, but it’s not a truly faithful adaptation to one of my favourite books. While I can understand having to change certain things when switching from one medium to another, there was too much changed in this series that actually took away from the story instead of adding to it, in my opinion.

If you watch the series on its own merits, you’ll probably enjoy it. But as an adaptation, I will say that I was a bit disappointed in many of the changes that were made from book to TV series.

Passenger List Season Two

Posted by cat2002116 on June 8, 2024
Posted in: Podcast, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

I’ll preface this review by saying that I don’t tend to listen to podcasts. I don’t tend to listen to audiobooks, either, to be completely honest; mostly because I can read books faster than listen to them, and audiobooks always make me think of being at school and being forced to read at the speed of everyone in the class, which was always ridiculously slow.

I can’t say I’m planning on listening to audiobooks anytime soon, but I’m definitely a convert to podcasts; or the fictional ones, anyway. I binge…listened?…to the whole of Passenger List season two in one day, and while it wasn’t what a comment I read said it was (a woman having creepy messages left on her answerphone), it was pretty engaging and drew me in really well anyway.

I just listened to season two, as I hadn’t realised season one was on the same page (just further down), but I don’t think you need to have listened to season one to understand what’s going on. I was able to follow the plot pretty well, as the first season had been about the disappearance of a plane, flight 702…while the second season involved debris from the wreckage being found, and almost everyone believing the passengers, pilot and crew on board to be dead. I say almost everyone, because Kaitlin Le…the sister of one of the passengers on board that ill-fated flight…receives a phone call that appears to be from her presumed-dead brother, Conor. And immediately after that phone call, she disappears without a trace.

After the initial episode, the focus switched to Rory, a lawyer representing the families of those supposedly killed in the crash of flight 702. What seems like a fairly straightforward wrongful death claim takes a vastly different turn when Rory discovers a group of family members who claim to have seen videos and received calls from the so-called deceased passengers of Flight 702.

As I was listening to this series, I had a huge amount of questions and theories. There were a couple of nice interactive touches through the website, although I would have liked to see a bit more detail. For instance, there was a computer game that was developed by one of the characters that linked in really nicely with one of the episodes. However, the password that needed to be entered wasn’t mentioned in the episode itself, or in the transcript…or, at least, not that I could find. And I found it very hard to reach the point in the game that was so integral to the episode. So it was a really good idea, but the game didn’t really go anywhere.

Kaitlin was definitely my favourite character in this series, although I did really like most of the other characters. I especially liked the parental relationship that seemed to form between Rory and her, and Jim and her. That was a really nice touch, especially as it seemed Kaitlin didn’t have the best relationship with her actual parents.

I can’t really comment on the visuals of this series, as it was a podcast. However, for the most part, the sounds worked really well to indicate what was going on. However, I couldn’t always tell the difference in tones with some of the minor characters, so I wasn’t always aware of who was talking. Still, the sounds did a really good job of immersing me into the story…and really helped me to listen through to the end.

I was a bit disappointed that there were some plotlines that didn’t really seem to go anywhere, like the people who were initially following Kaitlin. I couldn’t tell who they were there and they didn’t seem to really crop up again. Also, there were some parts where it was harder to suspend my disbelief, such as the passengers calling their family members. Without going into too much detail, what was being said in those phone calls really didn’t match how the series ended. However, those were only minor problems and didn’t really detract from my enjoyment of the series as a whole.

I will say that I hope there’s eventually a season three of this series, as it ends on something of a cliffhanger. But it also seems to have been greenlighted for a TV series, so…I really hope that does go ahead, as it would be great to see this series further expanded.

I definitely recommend listening to this if you enjoy podcasts/audiobooks. And even if you don’t, like me, I think you’ll still get a lot of enjoyment out of this. It’s honestly a really great thriller podcast, with characters I truly cared about and a moment right at the end where I literally shouted, “YES!” Fortunately, this was not in public, so no one else gave me any odd looks.

The Reappearance of Rachel Price

Posted by cat2002116 on May 27, 2024
Posted in: Books, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

After reading the Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series, Holly Jackson quickly became one of my favourite authors. So my sister and oldest nibling didn’t need to encourage me too much to buy this book and read it.

I will be honest that I wasn’t really that fond of Bel as a character for a lot of the book. I thought she was kind of mean, especially to Ash. I did like Ash as a character, so I felt a bit protective of him when Bel wasn’t really treating him very well.

From the book’s title, it was obvious that Rachel Price was going to appear after having been missing for so long. Having said that, I appreciated the fact that there was a buildup to her appearing again. By that, I mean Rachel didn’t just show up right at the start of the book. I had the chance to get to know Bel, and Bel’s relationship with her father, before Rachel came back into their lives and turned everything upside down.

While I wasn’t particularly fond of Bel as a character, at least to start with, I did enjoy seeing her relationship with Carter. I felt that was one of the strongest parts of the book, and Carter was a really well-rounded character. I did not like Sherry very much at all, considering that it felt like she was trying to be really controlling over Carter, and I felt like she didn’t really care about her daughter at all. Bel comments about a mother fighting for her daughter much later in the book, and I have to agree with her thoughts about Sherry fighting for Carter.

Throughout most of the book, I was trying to figure out what had happened to Rachel; why she’d disappeared, and why she suddenly returned. I had a mental list of theories that ranged from the extreme and unlikely (Rachel had been dead and dug herself out of her own grave, which was why she looked so bad when Bel initially saw her) to something that might have actually been possible, if it hadn’t been debunked by DNA testing (someone pretending to be Rachel in order to get fame/money). I can safely say that by the end of the book, I hadn’t even considered what had really happened, so Holly Jackson did a really good job of seeding the clues through the book without making it obvious what had really happened.

Outside of all that, I did feel that Bel reacted fairly realistically to having her mother suddenly show up after all those years, and I could easily relate to her need to find out what had really happened and what the truth was.

All in all, I really found this book engaging and easy to read. I had to find out what was going to happen next. If you enjoyed A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, I would definitely recommend reading this book.

And Then There Were None

Posted by cat2002116 on April 30, 2024
Posted in: Mystery, Plays, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I enjoy a lot of things based on Agatha Christie’s work, to be honest. There’s Poirot, with David Suchet (who is the only Poirot, because he just portrays the character so very well), but there are other films/TV series based on her books that I’ve enjoyed as well.

And Then There Were None was not a book I was familiar with, whether under its original name or one of the changed titles, so I had no real idea what to expect when I was going into the play. I think that was good, as I didn’t go into the play with any expectations of what I was about to see.

I have to say that the monologues at the beginning were a little bit boring. My attention unfortunately did wander a little bit as the characters introduced all of the reasons why they’d gone to Soldier Island…although that might have also been due to other factors, such as not realising the play started half an hour earlier than I’d assumed and trying to quietly eat food after giving myself insulin right before the house lights went down!

Anyway, once the play actually started in earnest, I found it really engaging. There was some mystery surrounding each of the characters as they interacted with each other and it became clear that none of them had actually met their host(s) in person…and then, when the phonograph recording was played, there was a rapid rise of tension. I’d originally thought that maybe all ten of the people had been responsible for the same murder(s), but the recording made it very clear that each person, or ‘soldier’, was responsible for a different crime.

The play felt very much like a slasher movie, with each of the characters being picked off by an unknown assailant in ways that matched the ten little soldier boys rhyme. It was interesting that there seemed to be a vaguely supernatural element to the play, as the spirits of some of the victims seemed to linger, staring at the spot where their body lay, There was also a really bizarre scene towards the end of the play where four of the characters start playing music and dancing. This gave such a different, weird vibe to the play as a whole, and I honestly thought that there was going to be an ending similar to that of Murder on the Orient Express.

On the whole, despite some slightly more weird moments in the play that made me think it was going for a subtly different genre, I did find this play to be engaging and filled with tension, despite the slow start. I’m definitely glad I got the chance to go and see this.

Bodies

Posted by cat2002116 on November 4, 2023
Posted in: Reviews, Science Fiction, Television, Thriller. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

This TV series was one that immediately caught my attention when I saw it advertised. The whole premise was an intriguing one, with a dead body being found by four different detectives…in four different time periods. I’ve always been interested in fiction that’s a little bit out of the ordinary, so this immediately piqued my interest.

I did think that all four of the time periods were really well-developed. It was very unclear how the storyline all fit together, though, and at first my working theory was that the body had been dropped by aliens. Since the series was advertised as being science fiction, I figured that at least was an explanation that made sense…though I still didn’t know how the same naked body, with a bullet wound in his eye (and no bullet in his skull) had cropped up in four different places.

The series was set in four different time periods: 1890, 1941, 2023 and 2053. Despite the large gap between all four of the time periods, they each felt as ‘real’ as the others. While I was watching the series, I didn’t feel like all of this had already happened…even when Shahara finds the old case files that indicate the body’s appeared twice before. The switching between the four different timelines didn’t really feel confusing at all…and I was able to form an emotional connection with each of the main characters and what was going on in their personal lives, as well as dealing with the mystery of the body that had suddenly appeared.

Real representation is something that is sadly lacking in so many films, TV series, books, etc. When I first started watching Bodies, I wasn’t expecting to connect to the four main characters…and even a couple of the minor characters…on a deep and emotional level. However, the forbidden love story between Alfred Hillinghead (the detective from 1890) and Henry Ashe (a journalist from the same time period) was done so extremely well that I’m still thinking about it a few weeks after finishing the whole series. Given that in 1890, homosexuality was treated much worse than it is now (and society is still not perfect now), seeing these two come together and develop feelings for each other, in spite of everything going on…and against the backdrop of the rest of the plot…was really powerful. And there was a deep connection between Hillinghead and the main ‘villain’ of the series.

In the 2053 timeline, with Iris Maplewood as the detective who finds the body, it’s clear that something devastated the world back in 2023. There’s a news story where survivors of whatever happened talk about the effects of it…of the world going dark. And as Iris’ storyline develops, it’s obvious that she too feels the effects of whatever occurred back then. When she meets her brother, he’s in a wheelchair…and it transpires that Iris herself wouldn’t have the ability to walk if it wasn’t for a piece of technology called a SPINE.

Throughout all four of the timelines, there’s a mysterious shadowy organisation that seems to be behind a lot of what’s going on. Those involved in the organisation greet each other with the phrase, ‘Know you are loved,’ which is also used as a codephrase. This organisation is around even in 2053, with Iris being employed by them. But their whole purpose and reason for actually being around isn’t made clear until the last couple of episodes of the series.

Shahara Hasan, the detective from 2023, is a really big focal point of the series, something that doesn’t become obvious until towards the end. She was an easily relatable and likable character who clearly wanted to do right for the two young men who were caught up in everything that was going on. When she went under the table to talk to Elias, who was so clearly an abandoned, frightened person in need of someone who loved him, that was a really powerful scene.

On the whole, I did think this series was really well done. It was a ‘limited’ series (which in Netflix’s terms means a ‘short’ series), but I felt that I was able to get to know about and care about the characters. All four of the detectives had their own lives, families and problems going on outside of the dead body they’d found…which was actually only a small snapshot of what was actually going on in the series.

I watched all eight episodes of this series in one day…and I would definitely watch a series two, if one was made. If you’re a fan of science fiction, I’d say that this series is definitely worth watching. By the end, things do make sense and are connected together…and there’s a lot more going on than just a random dead body showing up in four different time periods.

A Haunting in Venice

Posted by cat2002116 on September 24, 2023
Posted in: Movies, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment

I have watched the other two movies with this version of Poirot in…and I have to say, even though he doesn’t hold a candle to David Suchet (Suchet will always be Poirot, as far as I’m concerned), I did still find this movie entertaining.

I will say that this movie was clearly intended to be marketed as a supernatural thriller, which is pretty far from the original source novel. (Note: I haven’t actually read the book, but my understanding from the blurb is that it’s a different feel and vastly different characters).

I did think the movie was really good, despite it being more horror/creepy themed than I’m used to seeing from Poirot movies. I did feel there were a few too many characters; at various points, I couldn’t remember who was hiding which secret. Yes, everyone has secrets – but it was a little hard to suspend my disbelief that everyone had secrets directly connected to the murder plot.

The legend of the children’s vengeance made for quite a haunting backdrop to the murder mystery itself. However, I did think there was a bit too much exposition; it wasn’t necessary to be constantly reminded of the doctors and nurses part of the legend.

I did think there were some really good elements of foreshadowing in this movie. And the sense of something unnatural going on worked really well, along with the idea that Poirot might be losing something of his edge. Unfortunately, I did feel that forcing elements of horror constantly into the movie made it much more difficult to follow the threads of the mystery going on. Because I was so busy trying to figure out the possible causes of what Poirot was seeing, I wasn’t able to pick up on any of the clues about ‘whodunnit’.

I was pretty ambivalent towards most of the characters…with the exception of Ariadne, who irritated me. She seemed really flighty. Did she believe in the supernatural, or was she a skeptic? Her beliefs seemed to change and fluctuate as the plot demanded it.

On the whole, I think this movie would have been far better as an original story, rather than being a Poirot movie. It just didn’t really resonate in the same way as a good murder mystery does. If you’re looking for a good Poirot movie, I can’t say that this is really going to fill that void. But it’s probably worth watching if you’re on the fence about it.