When TV news producer Virginia Knightly receives a notice about the disappearance of a beautiful young attorney, something about the image stays with her. Despite what her colleagues think, Knightly suspects that there may be something sinister about this case, especially since she was last seen leaving an upscale restaurant after a domestic dispute. Knightly takes it upon herself to investigate this case, risking her career and her life as she dives into the dark underbelly of Washington, DC business and politics.
I thought this novel was quite interesting because it takes a different perspective in the mystery/thriller genre. This is the first time I have read a novel with the main character being a news producer, and it really gave me an insight into the reporter world. In her bio, the author mentions that she has a great deal of experience managing newsroom, and it is evident from the detail given to the setting; it made for a very enjoyable and interesting read, and I definitely learned a lot about what goes into making the news!
I really liked Virginia’s character. She has her eccentricities, like her obsession to find out the truth about everything. She is also a very strong and independent character, which I absolutely adored. Here was a character who did not really need to rely on others to do the job. She highlighted the gender disparities in the workfield very well, and was just such an intelligent character. There was a romance aspect that felt a bit weird to me; the characters had a history that I was unaware of, which led to some confusion in terms of understanding how this relationship worked and where everyone stood. The other characters in the book were also quite interesting and had their quirks, making them stand out.
Throughout the novel, I kept waiting for that dark side to come out. I was really excited to read about the “underbelly” of Washington, DC. I didn’t really get any of that. Most of the action was reserved for the newsroom, and the times when it happened during the investigation were a bit lackluster; it was just thrown together at the end and wasn’t well fleshed out. It was the one disappointing factor in an otherwise interesting read.
Overall, this novel gave me a unique perspective in an investigation and had very strong characters, which made me very happy. However, the thriller itself could have been better established. For those reasons, this book gets a 3/5 stars from me.
Happy reading ~
