The book mostly consists of transcripts of recordings made by dyslexic ex-con Steve as he tries to solve the mystery of what happened to his remedial English teacher after he gave her a book by out-of-fashion children's author Edith Twyford. Steve's quest to crack a secret code he believes to be hidden in the book, is aided by his childhood friends from the same class and librarian Lucy.
It's an uneasy hybrid of the Da Vinci Code with Enid Blyton and for most of the story I was aware of gaping holes in the narrative - How could such a fundamentally simple code be successfully hidden from anyone? Who on earth ever published such tortured prose in the first place? Where did all the deus ex machinas who repeatedly rescue Steve from moments of peril come from? - and the fact that these are neatly resolved by the final twist did not make it easier to suspend my disbelief and enjoy the earlier part of the story. In the final analysis, this book is more a puzzle solving exercise than a novel and, to be honest, I couldn't be bothered to grapple with it.
Selected quotes:
- "Never been in a bookshop before, have I? Second-hand books. Smells like an old person's house. Shelves stacked to the ceiling. Accident waiting to happen." (Audio file 37)
- "When you get what you want, you lose what you have." (Audio file 148)
November 2022; 388 pages
Winner of the British Book Awards Thriller of the Year 2023
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