Too many assumptions and loose ends.
Many thanks to NetGalley and to Storm Publishing for letting me see an advance reader’s copy of The Girl in the Loch by Andrew James Greig.
I’ve loved reading other Andrew Jame Greig books so I jumped at the chance of seeing a new series starring a new main character and team. And I wasn’t disappointed. The writing is beautiful. The locations are vivid. The characters are interesting and come to life.
In this introduction to the series, Private investigator Teàrlach Paterson has been hired to find a missing child. I really liked that very early on the main character basically told us how to pronounce his name, as either Charr Lock (or Charlie) or Sherlock, and for the rest of the book I read it as Charlie. This made a massive difference to readability.
Every scene change, every chapter change, the author used terrific, rich depth, dragging the reader into the story at every opportunity and keeping them there.
Saying that, I didn’t think it was so necessary to keep repeating his name in full. Paterson would have done. Or Teàrlach. Also, Paterson and Masterton (the person who hired him) are very similar names and it did get a bit confusing when they were both in the room at the same time.
Throughout, there are Americanisms and US English spellings, in a Scottish-set book. For example, the masculine blond for a girl instead of the feminine blonde; the American bandage as opposed to the British dressing or plaster; whirligig instead of rotary washing line. Unnecessarily fancy words have also been chosen when a simpler version wouldn’t have interrupted the reading. And many readers I know have never heard of Brigadoon.
The book could do with a thorough edit as Jane Whiting became Jane Whiteman and then went back again and the tense changed mid-sentence in places. There was some repetition. One character would say something unique to them and then a few pages later a different character would say the exact same thing. There are viewpoint shifts within paragraphs too. Teàrlach seems to have forgotten at one stage that Dee can listen in to his conversations via his phone. And daisies are white (with yellow centres) not yellow.
The book could also do with a sensitivity reader. Travellers and gypsies are not the same. Indeed, they are quite different. And to lump every single unresolved crime at the door of the travelling community is stereotypical at best and could be deemed racist by some.
Finally, the ending was very rushed. There were a few too many assumptions made and not enough loose ends tied up, especially the retired police officer who also lived on the banks of the same loch. And the whole of Chapter 32 was completely unnecessary to the storyline and can safely be deleted. Otherwise there’s a sniff of padding there.
But…it’s still a really good story set in a very beautiful part of the world with some characters I was rooting for on all sides. Roll on Book 2.
Four stars.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
