hungrycat reviewed Murder on the QE2 by Donald Bain (Murder, She Wrote, #9)
'QE2' Sails Through Crests, Mostly Troughs
2 stars
Unlike the steady course of the titular ship, this book had stops and starts throughout. Setting the story aboard a massive ocean liner--practically a vessel-set city--was an interesting premise. The convention of using Jessica as a shipboard playwright was novel. But this rendition fell short in many of the ways the other installments do. Namely, the net was cast a bit too wide in trawling for all the characters Jessica meets. There must have been nearly a dozen people introduced and whose names and roles I had to recall. Jessica's sailing companion was a bit too chummy and too similar to Jessica herself, almost making her redundant. The time required for the ship security to review camera footage was hardly believable. And of course the involvement of Jess's white knight George Sutherland felt like yet another deus ex machina contrivance to wrap things up neatly. Jessica might be looking forward …
Unlike the steady course of the titular ship, this book had stops and starts throughout. Setting the story aboard a massive ocean liner--practically a vessel-set city--was an interesting premise. The convention of using Jessica as a shipboard playwright was novel. But this rendition fell short in many of the ways the other installments do. Namely, the net was cast a bit too wide in trawling for all the characters Jessica meets. There must have been nearly a dozen people introduced and whose names and roles I had to recall. Jessica's sailing companion was a bit too chummy and too similar to Jessica herself, almost making her redundant. The time required for the ship security to review camera footage was hardly believable. And of course the involvement of Jess's white knight George Sutherland felt like yet another deus ex machina contrivance to wrap things up neatly. Jessica might be looking forward to a do-over of her crossing after this, but I'm not.
