Book Review: Twisted by Steve Cavanagh

Book Review for Twisted by Steve Cavanagh

Publisher: Orion

This will be my second foray into Steve Cavanagh books and although they were completely different plot and characters they were equally as captivating.

Twisted takes place in Port Lonely (which is a wonderful name for a town) where Maria discovers that her enigmatic husband is actually world-famous reclusive author J.T Lebeau. Despite his penny-pinching ways, it turns out that he has amassed six million in the bank and hasn’t told her. Reeling from the shock of this betrayal, Maria and her lover decide to blackmail her husband to gain his millions. (Of course, her infidelity is not a betrayal because she is genuinely in love and it’s her husband’s fault she is unhappy.)

But the truth is a tangled web and Maria finds herself caught up in a far deadlier game than she ever realised.

Despite Maria and her lover being extremely self-centred unlikable characters, they are so well written that they do not come off as stereotypes. In fact, all of the characters may be highlighted by their one primary characteristic (the stoic Detective, the old-timer Captain, the spoilt wife, etc) but they are so well developed that you can see them as real people.

The two police detectives did a good job in piecing things together and getting it brilliantly wrong but understandably so and then realising their error and trying to work out just what had gone wrong.

I loved the way the book showed you the dull parts of police work without actually feeling boring. The addition of those scenes made the book realistic enough to make sense but deliberate enough to capture your interest.

In point of fact, the entire book had enough descriptive language to draw you in without bogging you down with minor details. This enabled the book to flow beautifully and made it very hard to put down.

As for the twists, did you see them coming? Yes and then no and then yes and then no and then hell no! Where in the heck did that come from?

At one point I was thinking “Well, this is a bit predictable,” and then the next page was more “Whoa, what? Ok I did NOT see that coming.”

As someone who does like to guess and can usually see where things are going it was a refreshing change to be surprised and continually be surprised right to the last page.

As a result of this and the amazing Thirteen, Steve Cavanagh is definitely on my list of authors to read and recommend.

Outstanding.