Review: Jacquot and the Waterman

In the last three months, three young women have been found drugged and drowned in the waterways around Marseilles. The press are calling the killer “the Waterman.” Daniel Jacquot of the Marseilles Judiciaire has been working the case since the first two bodies turned up. Now he’s stuck with a new partner, Gastal, while his usual partner, Rully, is laid up with a broken leg. Gastal claims he’s got no interest in the Homicide squad and is merely waiting his call-up to Narcotics. Jacquot doesn’t care; he’s got a killer to catch.

But why is Gastal sending him on wild-goose chases after a man called Raissac, whose only connection to the Waterman case is that he owns the flat in which the most recent victim lived? And what do the company of Valadeau et Cie have to do with it all? Jacquot follows the trail wherever it may lead.

Jacquot and the Waterman is possibly the singularly most unsatisfying mystery I’ve ever read. I should have ignored it, I really should. After all, it revolves around my least-favourite plot device, the serial killer. And it’s positively immense at 405 pages in length. That alone should have warned me. But, I thought, it’s set in Marseilles. And its author is British. So in I plunged.

The book is overwhelmed with characters. There are so many, O’Brien should have included a list of the dramatis personae at the beginning of the novel so readers can keep track. Every time I turned the page for a new chapter, there was a new character, many of which only appeared the once or perhaps twice. I felt like banging my head against the wall out of sheer exasperation with the author.

Plot twists? Oh, sure, there are plenty of those. But they all fizzle out into nothing. In fact, there were more useless plot threads in this novel than I’ve ever encountered in all my years of reviewing. Unless you’re into padded-out mysteries that wander around the South of France, don’t bother with this one.

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

Book Review: Jacquot and the Waterman