a bit tedious; skipped pages ( )

DNF

Not my favourite from either Bude or the BL publishing arm. Find out why here:

https://nordie.wordpress.com/2015/12/27/book-review-the-lake-district-murder-by-...

Note: I received a digital review copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. ( )

Review contains mild spoilers

To be honest, this book felt like one very long math problem in words. Which is sad, because I was intrigued by the first few chapters and by the case: One of the two managers of a garage (service station) is found dead in his car, an apparent suicide. However, things do not seem right: The kettle was on, the table laid out, and more and more aspects come to light that make it seem improbable that this young man had wanted to end his life.
Reading these first chapters, I was excited to find out what happened and I enjoyed the small cosmos of the garage and its two managers, namely the dynamic between them.
Unfortunately, all of this is completely abandoned when Inspector Meredith discovers a side plot which may or may not be connected to the crime and tries to uncover a sort of smuggling ring using garages as drop off points. The following two hundred pages mainly consist of numbers: miles, gallons, orders, advance orders, surpluses, minutes (of gallons flowing through a hose),... In short, I wanted to scream and throw the book against the wall. I was so bored and the case went nowhere. When nothing changed after page 170 or thereabouts, I skimmed the remaining chapters until FINALLY the smuggling case was solved and the murder case resurfaced again: "'You're forgetting that a man named Clayton was found murdered in his garage on the night of March twenty-third." (p. 245). Well, I didn't forget, and I'm happy the author remembered now, too!
I kind of enjoyed the remaining 40 pages until the case was solved, but on the other hand I just wanted it to end by now, which is a shame because as I said, the initial premise was good and the beautiful cover and the blurb seemed more than promising.
Unfortunately, the Lake District itself plays only a minor role and apart from a few very short descriptions of the landscape, the story could have been set everywhere. ( )