Book Review: Shadow Sands

Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time! Former police officer turned criminology professor Kate Marshall, along with her teenage son, are scuba diving in the man-made reservoir of Shadow Sands in Devon when she chances upon the bloated body of a young man floating in the waters. The police are quick to close the case as a misadventure, but when the dead boy's mother enlists the help of Kate to look into the suspicious circumstances surrounding his death, unpleasant revelations of all sorts ensue. Robert Bryndza's latest outing suffers from a by-the-numbers narrative that becomes a tick-mark to the crime genre checklist, but manages to overcome its derivative plot structure with a strong sense of place and a great protagonist who would rather give it all to forget her past. A perfunctory-cooked thriller that could have been more gripping.

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