This was my first Mark Billingham book and overall I thought it was OK. The story starts with three British couples who meet on holiday in Florida but on their last night a teenage girl goes missing. After the holiday they keep in touch by each couple hosting a dinner party in turn. I found the first quarter of the book hard going. The chapters are not chronological: one chapter discussing dinner party preparations after the holiday, the next going back to the holiday itself. The couples are all unattractive small-minded people who dislike each other. The plot does get going about a quarter of the way through, and while I was hooked by this stage I still found the dinner party dialogue boring with too much unnecessary detail which slowed the pace down far too much. There was a twist at the end but unfortunately I could see it coming. Two and a half stars.
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Michael Drysdale 