A Fatal Crossing: Agatha Christie meets Titanic in this unputdownable mystery

Product Information

There’s a lot of repetition of the same interactions between the main two protagonists – I guess in an attempt to build up to the climax where everything is revealed but it’s done in a fairly lazy way where no new information is slowly revealed. My review today is of A Fatal Crossing by Tom Hindle which will be published by Century on 20th January in hardcover, eBook and audiobook. My thanks to Sarah Harwood PR for sending me a proof copy for review purposes.

News of the death of a passenger travels rapidly among the passengers, raising speculation as to the elderly man's identity and cause of death. The Endeavour's Captain, McCrory, is on his retirement voyage and is keen for the matter to be cleared up with the minimum of fuss and inconvenience to himself and his passengers. However, one passenger demands an audience with the Captain, identifying himself as a Scotland Yard detective James Temple, en route to New York on "police business", the nature of which he refuses to divulge. He raises certain suspicious anomalies that indicate that the passenger's death may not be as simple as the accident that the Captain is so keen to assume. While adamant that the passengers must not be unduly disturbed, Captain McCrory reluctantly accedes to Temple's insistence upon undertaking preliminary investigations, but only on the basis that ship's officer Timothy Birch accompany him at all times.

BLOG ARCHIVE

Now, with just days remaining until the Endeavour reaches New York, their search for the culprit is fraught with danger. A strong, determined, feisty female protagonist, the crimes credible, heinous, prevalent and feature in our news headlines far too often and a fabulous twist or two that will surprise the most hardened crime fiction reader. This is a fabulous read and I cannot wait for the next book in this series to arrive in my letterbox. Timothy Birch, an officer on The Endeavour, carries a great burden with him. His daughter Amelia has been missing for two years, and he feels responsible, as he was away at sea at the time. His wife Kate had pleaded with him not to go, worrying that should something happen, she wouldn’t have anyone to turn to, and then of course it did. Kate has since left him, and he’s completely distraught. That said, I’d whole-heartedly recommend this lively and entertaining mystery. The twists are suitably twisty and the denouement genuinely surprising. The setting is vivid and the characters are well-drawn, even if you do love to hate them at times!

The supporting characters in A Fatal Crossing are all really quite similar – they’re all relatively posh people who don’t add much to the story other than names to remember when you’re trying to piece together how everyone knows each other or how they might be linked to the murder. It’s quite clear that on a ship you’re a captive audience, but imagine being on said ship with a killer on board! Lone Theils, η οποία μια μακρά δημοσιογραφική υπηρεσία στο βιογραφικό της, αφού έχει εργαστεί για 16 συναπτά έτη ως ανταποκρίτρια στο Λονδίνο για λογαριασμό των δανέζικων εφημερίδων Berlingske Tidende και Politiken, κυκλοφορεί από τις εκδόσεις Μεταίχμιο, ως μια εναλλακτική, θα λέγαμε, πρόταση στην κατηγορία των αστυνομικών θρίλερ. Ουσιαστικά, πρόκειται για το πρώτο βιβλίο μιας σκανδιναβικής νουάρ σειράς, με κ��ντρική ηρωίδα τη Νόρα Σαν, διανθισμένο με νότες βρετανικού αστυνομικού, ακολουθώντας, ωστόσο, σε αρκετά μεγάλο βαθμό την λογική των βιβλίων του Thomas Harris, με μια ιστορία ειπωμένη μέσα από ένα καλειδοσκοπικό κοινωνιολογικό πλαίσιο. Σας μπέρδεψα; Ας πιάσουμε, τότε, τα πράγματα από την αρχή.The very first thing I noticed about this book was the author’s writing style. Calling it juvenile might go a bit too far but it was definitely too tame for my taste. Bland and boring, it was immediately forgettable and repetitive. It’s always “the ship stretches the best part of…” or “the best part of fifty thousand tons” or “the restaurant’s capacity to seat the best part of five hundred diners” or “the best part of an hour/minute”… I loved how the game was constructed and how everything went down hill when a murder happened during the murder mystery party. Even though Fatal Crossing took me a while to get into I did end up enjoying it and I’ll be keeping an eye out for the next book. I’m hoping it will be translated into English one day. I initially rated this three stars but I decided that a book that made me let out a groan [ frustrated, not sexual] loud enough to shake awake my co-workers at our late shift at the psych ward deserves two stars max.