Review: Eeny Meeny

Eeny Meeny (Helen Grace, #1)Eeny Meeny by M.J. Arlidge

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Two people are abducted, imprisoned, and left with a gun. As hunger and thirst set in, only one walks away alive.


It’s a game more twisted than any Detective Helen Grace has ever seen. If she hadn’t spoken with the shattered survivors herself, she almost wouldn’t believe them.


Helen is familiar with the dark sides of human nature, including her own, but this case—with its seemingly random victims—has her baffled. But as more people go missing, nothing will be more terrifying than when it all starts making sense….
 


I like the idea of this one, and while I didn’t hate it I think there are lots of things that could’ve been done better. It sort of feels like this books was mainly to introduce the main character, but you didn’t really get the chance to actually feel anything for her. Sure there were moments where you felt like you got a piece of her backstory, and the ending was a bit interesting and could maybe make me interested enough to read more, if it hadn’t been for how rushed the whole thing felt.

Several people manages to get kidnapped through the story, but you never got time to get to know them. You didn’t really feel like there was one you wanted to live over the other, and you didn’t feel much when one of them eventually died. Even if the story wasn’t about them, I feel like the author could’ve done a lot more to make us actually feel for them.

The so called plot twist in the end didn’t really do much for me, either. It was a tad surprising, but not in a way that me think “what the fuck did just happen” but rather shrug and say “okay that makes sense” which, in my opinion, isn’t really how a book like this should turn out. Also I can’t believe the so called brilliant detective didn’t figure it out herself. To her, it should’ve been obvious, even if it wasn’t for us, because well… we hadn’t gotten to know her backstory so we didn’t really have anything to go on. Good job, detective. A career change might be worth considering.

It was worth reading, but it didn’t do much for me and unlike many other books I don’t think I will read it again. The idea is brilliant, the plot twist could’ve been absolutely amazing, but unfortunately, it wasn’t. It was simply ok.