A Slow Fire Burning by Paula Hawkins. (2021).
**2.5 out of 5 stars*
Laura has spent most of her life being judged. She’s seen as hot-tempered, troubled, a loner, and some call her dangerous. Miriam knows that just because Laura is witnessed leaving the scene of a horrific murder with blood on her clothes, that doesn’t mean she’s a killer. Bitter experience has taught her how easy it is to get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Carla is reeling from the brutal murder of her nephew. She trusts no one: good people can do bad things. But how far will she go for peace? Innocent or guilty, everyone is damaged. Some are damaged enough to kill.
This author is perhaps best known at the monent for the ever popular “The Girl on the Train” which got itself a movie adaption. This is her latest novel which for me unfortunately is not as good as her previous. I thought this one had an intriguing concept, that just wasn’t executed well. I want to point out that it was a bit odd that within the book, mention is made of how jumping around in storylines can be annoying…. which is exactly what this story did? It just didn’t flow well. The other big negative in my opinion was that I found basically every character quite unlikable and unsympathetic, which was odd because most of them had some kind of horrible incident in their lives which would normally lead to some kind of sympathy or empathy; the only character I liked was an elderly woman named Irene who was clever and kind.
Overall, the reviews are fairly mixed on this one and it wasn’t really for me but I’m sure many readers would enjoy it.
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