Beautiful Bad sounded like just my thing: psychological thriller, plucky heroine, remote locations, etc. So I was happy to provide an honest review in return for a copy from Harlequin/Park Row and NetGalley.
This one has several of the things I like (listed above), and a few that maybe I have just gotten tired of, having read so many in this vein: alternating points of view, plot jumping back and forth in time, etc. But the cover blurb (“The perfect marriage leads to the perfect crime”) kind of hooked me.
The story opens with a chapter entitled “Maddie: Twelve Weeks Before,” told from Maddie’s point of view, followed by a chapter “Day of the Killing,” switching to third person. Fortunately, I read the whole thing in a couple of days so I was able to keep track of what led up to the killing, and that the center of the story is the story of travel writer Maddie’s romance and eventual marriage to Ian, a British soldier. The story includes Maddie’s best friend Joanna, who Maddie is visiting when she first meets Ian. After nearly 20 years, Maddie and Ian are settled down in the quiet Kansas town Maddie was so eager to escape when she began her travels in the Balkans. They have a son, Charlie, and seem to be living a perfect suburban life in Middle America.
Maddie suffer an accident (or was it?) on a camping trip and begins writing therapy to help her deal with things, including her scarred face and deteriorating relationship and disappointment with Ian. She tells her therapist in her writing assignments about Ian’s PTS, which have led her to be worried about Charlie’s safety (and her own). The story takes Maddie and Ian to various locales, including the Balkans, Iraq, New York City, and Kansas.
On the “Day of the Killing,” a frantic 911 call summons the police to the scene of a murder.I did NOT see the ending coming until very near the end…not unusual for me, but still a nice twist. As I said, I may be up to my eyeballs in the whole plucky-heroine-in-danger-thriller genre, but I didn’t LOVE this one. Might also be somewhat due to the lack of characters about whom I cared if anything bad happened to them. Three stars, probably would be four if I weren’t cranky today…