Rating: 3.2/5
This latest offering from the immensely talented Dreda Say Mitchell and her real life partner Ryan Carter is marketed as a thriller, but I would suggest that description is a little misleading. This is far more of a mystery drama with a strong socio-political campaigning message at its heart.
As a campaigning piece of fictional literature - focussing on the imbalanced and unsatisfactory manner in which the law enforcement agencies (and society in general) treat females of colour who disappear in suspicious circumstances - "Say Her Name" does its job well. It is eloquently written and the authors make their point very clearly.
Against that, when viewed as a piece of crime fiction, the mystery drama element of the novel does have a few shortcomings. Unusually for Dreda Say Mitchell, the narrative is a little clunky in parts and the characterisation, too, is a bit sketchy at times. This is particularly noticeable with the lead character, Eva, who, as a qualified doctor, is clearly a very intelligent individual, but who manages to come across as unbelievably naïve on a number of occasions. The authors also drop number of Americanisms into the narrative at various points, which seem strangely out of place in a book set in London and not written by an American author.
However, the most significant shortcoming is a gaping plot hole relating to the character of Danny. I won't go into greater detail here, because I always endeavour to keep my reviews as spoiler-free as possible - and this particular point relates to something that fundamentally underpins the whole plotline. It is, nonetheless, a major inconsistency and there is never any attempt by the authors to address it, let alone explain it. Perhaps they are just hoping that readers will either simply not notice, or else be prepared to take a giant leap of faith unquestioningly.
Imperfections aside this still makes for entertaining and engaging reading, but just isn't quite up there with the very best in the genre.
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![Say Her Name by [Dreda Say Mitchell, Ryan Carter]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41RYC0HWmCL._SY346_.jpg)
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Customer reviews
The story was really moving and made me cry.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 2 March 2022
I'm a huge fan of Dreda.I enjoy her books immensely and I like the research that goes into them.I was lucky enough to be given a ARC for a honest review.I read a lot of books and find it hard sometimes to come across a thriller that grips you from the start.But ' Say Her Name ' certainly does that.It's an excellent and exciting thriller about a young woman called Eve who is searching for her birth parents. Along the way she finds out about betrayal and darker sides to people and who she can and can't trust.I was intrigued by the characters and felt like I knew Eve , you can feel her pain with the issues that she was to discover regarding black women and what they were up against.I felt bad for her and sympathetic.There was a lot of tense moments that mad me feel sad for the characters and what they went through.It was really moving and did make me cry.I felt that Dreda wrote the story from her heart and despite it being exciting and fast paced it also really touches the reader.I would imagine it was a really hard book to write and get completely right.Yet Dreda manages to do that perfectly without any doubt.This book kept me awake all night because I couldn't put it down.It's a real page turner and opened my eyes like never before with a few twists here and there.It certainly is a shocking revelation for Eve and shocks you to the core.It certainly sets the scene and gives the desired impact.You can understand how issues facing Black women inspired Dreda to write this best seller.I highly recommend this book I really enjoyed it.It will keep you gripped from start to finish.Fantastically writen by a lovely author.Another fantastic book Dreda Say Mitchell.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 2 March 2022
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