| Publisher | Severn House |
|---|---|
| Date Published | 28 November 2014 |
| ISBN-10 | 072788445X |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0727884459 |
| Format | hardcover |
| Pages | 240 |
| Price | £ 19.99 |
False Impression
by
Bea Abbot’s well-ordered house and domestic agency turn to chaos when a close friend looks like being framed for murder.
Review
Books like False Impression make me very glad that we’ve been spared most of the religious crime fiction that the US gets. Apparently author Veronica Heley has been on the committee of the Association of Christian Writers (what do they do, apart from pray?) and attends such and such a Methodist church. Good for her, but the proselytising makes my teeth hurt.
False Impression is odd. Really, really odd. Presumably it’s part of a series, but there’s little backstory. Bea Abbot, a feisty woman of a certain age, runs a domestic agency. She has a gentleman friend in the shape of Leon Holland, a wealthy businessman. But it looks like someone is trying frame Leon for murder.
Bea’s house is like something out of Keystone Cops, with folk in and out all the time. Characters are thin, to put it politely. And Heley never saw a stereotype she didn’t like. Oh look, there’s a gay character, but of course he flounces, is a spoiled brat, works in the creative industries and wears bright clothes. And a character wonders aloud if He Had Been Different whether things wouldn’t have turned out like they did. Bea likes her prayers, and muses at bizarre moments as to whether so-and-so is a Christian.
False Impression is bizarrely static with humungous amounts of tell and not the slightest semblance of show. Bea paces her kitchen and house, strange people run in and out, arms are thrown up in the air a lot and Bea resists the temptation to slap people (doesn’t sound very Christian to me). By the end of the book I was wondering if the dratted woman was agoraphobic, as she never leaves the house!
The tale would have benefited from a very rigorous edit. When chapter 17 starts with the word ‘recap’, I start to worry. And there are bizarre Americanisms littered around. Why would a British police inspector flash his shield? Cellphones abound. And someone gets a raise. Heley blithely hand-waves computer technical issues, which are key to the plot – some pretence of research would have been nice.
False Impression is pretty mild in the scheme of things when it comes to labelling it as religious crime fiction – in many ways it’s simply a not very good cosy. But it needs a lot less praying and wondering whether people are good Christians, and a damn sight more attention to realism, characterisation and storytelling. And the sad thing is, I really wanted to like Bea, as she’s an older character with spirit.
False Impression is odd. Really, really odd. Presumably it’s part of a series, but there’s little backstory. Bea Abbot, a feisty woman of a certain age, runs a domestic agency. She has a gentleman friend in the shape of Leon Holland, a wealthy businessman. But it looks like someone is trying frame Leon for murder.
Bea’s house is like something out of Keystone Cops, with folk in and out all the time. Characters are thin, to put it politely. And Heley never saw a stereotype she didn’t like. Oh look, there’s a gay character, but of course he flounces, is a spoiled brat, works in the creative industries and wears bright clothes. And a character wonders aloud if He Had Been Different whether things wouldn’t have turned out like they did. Bea likes her prayers, and muses at bizarre moments as to whether so-and-so is a Christian.
False Impression is bizarrely static with humungous amounts of tell and not the slightest semblance of show. Bea paces her kitchen and house, strange people run in and out, arms are thrown up in the air a lot and Bea resists the temptation to slap people (doesn’t sound very Christian to me). By the end of the book I was wondering if the dratted woman was agoraphobic, as she never leaves the house!
The tale would have benefited from a very rigorous edit. When chapter 17 starts with the word ‘recap’, I start to worry. And there are bizarre Americanisms littered around. Why would a British police inspector flash his shield? Cellphones abound. And someone gets a raise. Heley blithely hand-waves computer technical issues, which are key to the plot – some pretence of research would have been nice.
False Impression is pretty mild in the scheme of things when it comes to labelling it as religious crime fiction – in many ways it’s simply a not very good cosy. But it needs a lot less praying and wondering whether people are good Christians, and a damn sight more attention to realism, characterisation and storytelling. And the sad thing is, I really wanted to like Bea, as she’s an older character with spirit.
Reviewed 07 February 2015 by Sharon Wheeler
