TABOO

TITLE: TABOO
AUTHOR: CASEY HILL
Pages: 409
Date: 13/02/2011
Grade: 4
Details: no. 1 Reilly Steel?
Own


Melissa Hill is the very popular and successful author of several so called chick-lit titles. Feeling the need to explore the darker side of human nature she teamed up with her husband Kevin, adopted the name Casey Hill for the partnership and proceeded to bring us Taboo.
And boy did she succeed in delving into the dark-side.
Reilly Steel is a California born and Quantico trained forensic investigator who finds herself in Dublin, training Irish crime-scene investigators and keeping an eye on her alcoholic father.
Working in forensics in Ireland should be a nice, relatively quiet, job for someone who trained and worked in America, but Reilly soon finds herself investigating multiple scenes of horrible deaths.
But, what at first appear to be unrelated and not necessarily criminal deaths, soon turn out to be very disturbing and twisted murders, perpetrated by someone who doesn't leave any clues behind, unless that's their intention.
Working the case brings back memories of Reilly's troubled past especially when the clues left behind turn personal. The truth however, once it does emerge, is far more horrific than Reilly could ever have imagined.

This is, what I assume to be, the first book in a series and as such it was very promising.
The story is intriguing, horrific and thrilling. The murders are as depraved as you'd expect from a decent thriller, the characters as interesting and flawed as they should be and the conclusion suitably shocking.
However, there is some room for improvement in my personal opinion.
The story felt a little bit flat to me. I wasn't as shocked by the murders as I should have been given their descriptions and I never really got a good feel for the main characters. I also got to the solution before the main character Reilly did, but I've got a feeling that was supposed to happen, given the story.
Yes, the story may have had a few shortcomings, but in the end it was a good read with a fascinating story and a satisfying ending. An ending that appears to leave room for possible sequels. And I do hope that those sequels will come as I'm sure that it would turn out to be onwards and upwards all the way.