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Heh, I took this book because it had a "reader's award" and was 3€, and I needed some light reading to waste time during a trek and was intrigued by the synopsis (a mystery thriller about fishing legislation in Quebec). Honestly, very disappointed.

The book alternates between a thriller narrative and actual news transcripts/fictional historical short-stories from the past. The latter are the strongest and best sections of this book, the former is incredibly cliché. They suffer from the "man writing woman" syndrome where every female character is discussed as food for the men. Either as romantic interests or straight up meat for the bad guys to rape (or discuss raping.) They are here for the men to rescue. I honestly don't care much about this were it done well but it's honestly a little overplayed and repetitive. There are also action sequences (I'm starting to think novels aren't meant for action sequences) that are very quick and hard to care for. Basically step by step descriptions of a mediocre Netflix action-flick. Finally, the dialog. I get that this is a political novel, but I'm starting to think all Quebecois can talk about is their weird nationalism. Because every conversation in this book, no matter the initial topic, devolves into a heated debate about Quebec nationalism in some way or another. It's very jarring.

Overall this book struggles to be both an engaging thriller and a political/historical piece. It should've focused on the latter because the thriller was deeply unengaging, I could hardly give a shit by the end about any of the characters or their outcome and mostly enjoyed the short stories in-between.

God I loved this book. Probably my favorite so far and the one that makes me want to start writing myself. The writing is both highly competent but also at times light and fun. The author has no issue bringing up outlandish or cliché coincidences for the sake of an emotional hit or a good joke. This book made me smile more than any other, the non linear narrative was very cinematic and easy to follow. More surprising, the final twist. Somehow a twist with little build up (I didn't think the hints leading up were important or something to pay attention to) and yet 100% pay off. Once I read the line I legitimately had to do a double take and read previous passages with a massive smile on my face and complete disbelief. Rarely has a book stuck with me for as long as this one did and it honestly was very unfair to the books that came after.