"A Greek Misadventure" by Elaine Collier

 Two best friends, Donna and Fiona, nearing the big five-oh, decide to take a holiday in Greece to resurrect memories of their student days.Within days of their arrival they are locked up and accused of smuggling drugs. They are released from jail to protective custody on a luxury yacht from which they are then kidnapped. Can the police find them and rescue them before they are murdered?

If you like simple thrillers in which the goodies do battle with the baddies in classic holiday locations with a bit of romance thrown in, this may be the book for you. It was easy to read and quick, I suspect, to write. 

It took a long time to get going. A lot of the first quarter was concerned with the mechanics of going on holiday. In some books this might have been an opportunity for character and theme development but it was mostly about expounding the back stories. I failed to see the point of some chapters, for example chapter 11.

Even after we had finally started the main story, there is very little tension. We are told the identity of the man seen unloading the boxes within pages, as if the author herself is immune to spoiler alerts. 

The characterisation lacks nuance and is mostly delivered through 'tell don't show'. We are told the lead villain "had the swagger of a cocky little shit." (Ch 21) He lacks any saving grace. Fiona's husband, another baddy, is similarly one-dimensional: "The man was a total self-obsessed arse who just wanted a trophy wife." (Ch 42) One presumes Fiona married him either through extreme stupidity or extreme cupidity. Only one character, a minor villain, had any sort of character development. As for the owner of the yacht, he was extraordinarily handsome, charming, a multi-millionaire and so nice he was prepared to get himself shot just to help out. Such people must exist but I've never met them.

There was some humour. Of a member of the air crew, we are told: "His training programme flew by and before he knew he was working on a real aircraft". (Ch 13)

May 2024

This review was written by the author of Bally and Bro, Motherdarling  and The Kids of God