Hits all the wrong spots
Second Life
author: S. J. Watson Publisher: HarperCollins, fiction
A RIVETING psychological thriller. That’s what I was promised by the blurb for Second Life, the new book by S. J. Watson. Who doesn’t love a riveting psychological thriller? I prepared myself by sitting on the edge of my seat, then began to read.
The story revolves around the happily married Julia who, with husband Hugh and adopted son Connor, leads a quiet, humdrum life in the suburbs. Their peaceful lives are shattered, though, when Julia’s wild younger sister ( Connor’s real mum!) is found murdered in a Paris alley. Julia takes the news badly and decides that she is going to take it upon herself to find the murderer. Yes, even though the police are involved.
Setting out with nothing but her amazing crime- fighting skills ( she’s a photographer who specialises in birthday parties), Julia goes to Paris to track down her sister Kate’s killer. She discovers Kate is registered with a risqué online dating site and her detective instincts kick in, leading her to imitate her sister on the account, and start leading two separate lives ( Sure, why not? All the great detective stories go like this). The rest of the story just goes downhill from here.
I really wish there was something positive I could say about this book. The story is highly implausible, reading like sensationalist pulp fiction rather than a riveting psychological thriller. The sex and violence follow suit, with words intended to shock rather than encourage the reader to think about the scenes being played out.
The author has also chosen to write the entire book in short staccato sentences, which tends to overdramatise everything being said or described to a point where it just becomes a satire of itself.
This is a pity, because the book actually covers important themes like online privacy, online predators, violence, and rape; if it had not been written as though every sentence is the most thrilling thing ever written by the hand of Man, this book might have resonated more with me.
I want to say that the ending was the best part, but unfortunately that would be a lie – because the book has no end. Everything is tied up conveniently, but the book does not have an end, satisfying or not. This seems to be a new trend among authors who are more interested in sensational prose than actually telling a story, but who then cannot envision an end to the book so they just trail off into a vague non- ending – or in the case of Watson, just stop writing and hope everyone is impressed enough with his cleverness not to notice.
I don’t often find books bad all round, but this one hits all the wrong spots. Read a classic instead. All those books have endings, and none of them are written in three word sentences.