Book Review: Now You See Me

Reviewed By: Catherine Thompson - RAM

Now You See Me     Amazon UK PB Amazon UK HC
Margaret Murphy
Class/Genre:   Mystery
Hodder & Stoughton, $24.95 trade paperback, 392 pages

When Megan Ward goes missing, suspicion naturally falls on the man seen hanging around the house where she’s been rooming. But a cursory search of her room brings up more questions about Megan herself: the police find no photos, no passport, nothing that points to a link with friends or family. Only the files on her computer are left, corrupted by a logic bomb.

At the same time, Patrick Doran, owner of Safe Hands Security, finds his own security breached. His computer files have been hacked, and Doran has been robbed of every penny, including those he never told Inland Revenue about.

Then Megan’s landlady is murdered, and Megan re-emerges, no less shadowy than when she was missing. It will take the combined forces of DCI Jeff Rickman, DS Lee Foster, and DC Naomi Hart, plus the rest of the Edge Hill station, to get to the bottom of her and her seeming obsession with Doran.

Now You See Me is the follow-up to The Dispossessed. Murphy brings back her Liverpool police team in a real cracker of a thriller that combines technology and good old-fashioned hands-on violence. This book focuses more on Foster, rather than Rickman as The Dispossessed did. Foster builds a peculiar rapport with Megan, and she is seen most often through his perspective. Rickman and his family problems are still evident, but pushed more towards the background.

Murphy knows how to spin a tale. She also knows police work and the tedium it can engender. She shows the members of the Edge Hill station in moments of drudgery and despair as well as during the highs that new evidence brings.

Catherine Thompson - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Catherine Thompson - RAM

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