Rebecca, a brilliant cancer researcher, disappears after a one-night stand with a neurotic man with a questionable past. Her sudden disappearance in the midst of a high-stakes quest to cure cancer between two rival billionaires sets into motion an inexplicable chain of events as the bodies start to pile up.
No one knows why she disappeared. The race to find answers ensnares everyone around her, one of whom is a deeply disturbed psychopath lurking in the shadows.
Is Rebecca still alive? What happened to her? Who did it? And why? Questions about her vex everyone looking for answers. No one can be trusted and no one is above suspicion..***
[She was wearing a gorgeous black dress]***
(Fireflies Publishing, 1 February 2017, copy provided by the publisher via NetGalley and voluntarily reviewed)
***
***
There's some good stuff in The Girl at the Bar and some stuff that just didn't work for me.
Let's start with the good stuff:
I thought the concept was quite original with regards to the cancer-cure aspect of the story. I've never read a science thriller before (not to my knowledge anyway). Just enough information is given about Rebecca's work to create a blurry outline but not enough to bore you.
The characters are well written. My favourite was Ragnor, the man Rebecca has a one night stand with. He's wonderfully flawed and very real.
The pacing of the novel is excellent. There's nothing worse than a slow thriller but too fast pacing doesn't always work. The pacing is spot on and events unfold at the perfect speed.
The writing is good for the most part. I was engaged.
Now onto the not so good:
There are a few sections told from the point of view of the villain. For some reason the author decides to refer to this person as the void and uses abstract language to describe their thoughts, feelings and actions. I found this really confusing. Why refer to the villain in such a weird way? At first I thought this was going to lead to some sort of supernatural twist - but no! I just found this really clunky and off-putting at times.
At the end of the novel there is a really long chapter split into sections. The sections alternate from the point of view of many different characters including the void with a page break between. This wasn't executed very well and became a jumbled mess at time, quite clumsy.
I got a little sick of the descriptions of how beautiful and brilliant and perfect Rebecca was. Come on; give a lady a little more depth please. This was redundant after the first 100 mentions.
The title was okay but I'm sort of sick of thriller with the word girl in the title.
