An Influential Murder - Sydney Booth 2 by Wendy Owens
⭐⭐⭐ . 5
Is fame something worth dying for?
When social media influencer Cassie hires Sydney to catch her stalker, Sydney thinks it's a straightforward case. But as she delves deeper, Sydney discovers a tangled web of deceit and jealousy surrounding Cassie's life.
With Cassie's safety on the line, Sydney must navigate the dangerous dark side of social media to uncover the truth before it's too late.
Will Sydney solve the case in time to save Cassie's life?
An Influential Murder
Review in Amazon
https://www.amazon.in/review/RN9VM2PEMIWSD
Close to 3.5 stars for me.
The best part of the book is the time taken to complete it. At just over 160 pages it is an eminently short reading and can actually be completed in a single extended session. While juggling over 30 books, I still completed this in 4 days of spaced out reading.
The story line would sound familiar with incidents like this becoming a part of our daily lives.
This book at heart is a whodunit and is a set piece of the modern times where internet influencers are queen and king respectively and have an adulation and following which goes beyond what celebrities traditionally got. What also sets them apart is that with content being king (pun intended), what would trend is like the definition of beauty. The background of the influencer does not have any impact on their popularity/notoriety.
The principal character in this story is an influencer and one with tremendous following but seemingly low scruples. Some part of the highs and lows of the life of an influencer is alluded to in this novel and the seedy by lanes of the popularity/notoriety plays its part in the story.
The protagonist Sidney is a character well etched filled with trepidation. Her background is one of the finest I have read about in a protagonist/heroine and the author Wendy Owens is to be commended for such a seemingly complex character, an independent investigator with a cupboard overflowing with family skeletons. Serial killers in the family and a life wrenched and torn apart by the history and trying to find her dose of sanity which she gets with her betrothed, a person who loves her.
The story arc follows Sidney Booth, our protagonist is called in by a famous influencer to track a stalker who seems to be hounding her. Sidney with her new status as an investigator or private eye is days away from her own marriage and is juggling her time to meet the rigors of getting married, i.e. all the requirements like bridal dress, decor, guests, the cake, food, her groom, etc. get the picture.
Absolutely not the right time to get involved in this case but when Cassie calls her up telling her story, Sydney reminisces her own difficult rite of passage the preceding year (no spoilers here read the book) and she jumps to help her. The story takes her to Las Vegas and the glorious life of Cassie and her various relationships through which Sydney has to wade through and identify the person at the heart of the crime. Murder follows soon after and it is a smooth ride throughout.
What worked for me was that Wendy has made a good case for herself with the characters well etched. The narcissistic character of Cassie, the mousy character of her assistant, the flamboyance of Cassie's friends, the paparazzo and the indifferent police who seem to take everything Cassie puts forward with more than pinches of salt. This is a good take as the lives of these flamboyant creators are often glorified and their mistakes/gaffes are made notorious by the public and people in admin often club them at the same levels as streetwalkers and often as if they have brought the issue upon themselves because of their actions. This is a good creation by the author.
What did not work for me in this story was the depth of the crime. I am a passionate thriller man and consume books of this genre with aplomb and always try to second guess the author. With decades of reading and thousands of books read, I reach the point before the end 7 or 8 times out of 10.
In whodunit mysteries my ratings reflect the difficulty in pin pointing the antagonist and also the clues or red herrings in the story.
In this story I was able to zero in on the antagonist early and hence the three-three and a half star rating. For other readers this would be higher.
Still I enjoyed the tale and would love to try more of her offerings and recommend this book.
⭐⭐⭐ . 5
Recommended
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