Book review: L S Hilton, Maestra

By describing this as “a shockingly original thriller”, the publishers may have raised expectations which I’m afraid they couldn’t fulfil, hence the mixed reviews. Some of the protagonist’s moves are, if not shocking, at least pleasantly surprising, and while her trajectory has too much in common with that of The Talented Mr. Ripley to be thought original, it’s better to have a good plot which has been used before than a completely novel one which fails to engage the reader.

I enjoyed this thoroughly and almost without reservations. Though I was alarmed when the antiheroine found herself aboard a yacht in the Mediterranean as the arm-candy of a hedge-fund gazillionaire, the plot quickly moved in unexpected directions. The protagonist’s surname, Rashleigh, is apt enough. She repeatedly risks getting on the wrong side of some very dangerous people, at first out of desperation but later apparently because she has a taste for danger. While she is perhaps luckier than she deserves to be, she is intelligent and quick-thinking enough to gain the reader’s good will, in spite of her unfortunate deficiency in the area of conscience.

Brava!

Originally posted on Goodreads, August 2016