In Case of Emergency
A Novel
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3.8 • 49 Ratings
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- $13.99
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
When her boyfriend goes missing and a woman turns up dead, Charlotte must connect the dots for herself before she becomes the suspect, or the next victim.
Charlotte, a mid-thirties Long Island woman, has felt so alone since her promising career in neuroscience imploded. But she has an online support group; she has Rachel, a friend who has seen her through the worst of it; and now she also has Peter, a mysterious new boyfriend who has asked that their budding romance remain a total secret.
That is why she is too scared to report his disappearance to the authorities when he vanishes without a word.
Weeks later, police contact her to make an ID on a body, and she fears the worst for her missing beau. Instead, she arrives at the morgue and feels a terrible relief when she sees a woman she has never met on the table in front of her. But relief is replaced by confusion, then terror, when Charlotte realizes she has become a person of interest.
Why did Jane Doe have Charlotte listed as her emergency contact? Was it revenge or a warning? And where exactly does Peter factor into all this? As Charlotte becomes the prime murder suspect, she enters into a race against the clock to find out the truth about the dead woman and the connections they shared. But what she discovers is beyond anything she could have ever imagined.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A promising career in neuroscience ended for Charlotte Knopfler, the protagonist of this plodding mix of medical thriller and police procedural from the pseudonymous Scott (The Woman Inside), when she was partially blamed for a patient's death. Now she practices acupuncture, sharing a Long Island, N.Y., office space with her best friend, a masseuse, and participating in an online support group for trauma survivors. Charlotte remains upset about her aborted medical career, but she's especially worried about the disappearance of Peter Stanton, her mysterious new boyfriend, whom she has never met in person. Their relationship has been forged through texts and emails, often in code, since Peter says he works undercover for the government. Then, the police ask Charlotte to identify the body of a woman, who named Charlotte as her emergency contact, though Charlotte has never met her. When Charlotte becomes a suspect in the murder, she launches her own rather insipid investigation. Charlotte's emotional fragility rings true, but her naive if not downright silly actions stretch credulity. Genre fans can safely take a pass.
Customer Reviews
Big fan
Good read!
Good idea, poor execution
A good rule of thumb in storytelling is “show, don’t tell.” The corollary is not to explicitly tell what is already shown.
This story would have benefited from these guidelines.
Simpler is better. The shifting narratives don’t appear to have a purpose, other than emulating a popular style. In some cases, it’s both unnecessary and confusing, e.g., the voices of the two detectives are essentially identical. The story might have worked better in third person.
Dialogue was uneven. At times, the characters simply spouted plot points in service of moving the story along. At other times, the conversation flowed in a believable manner. The contrast is jarring.
And this extract:
“She is a dead ringer for a young Stevie Nicks. We’ve been mistaken for sisters more than once, which I always take as a compliment.”
A) Inherent assumption the reader knows who Stevie Nicks is and what she looked like in the 1970s; B) the protagonist and her best friend look alike; C) the authors want you to know that the protagonist looks like this celebrity. That’s a lot of heavy lifting for a reader. Why not just describe Stevie Nicks and attribute the descriptors to the character?
Showing would be so much more effective: “Rachel’s soft hair and soulful eyes give her an ethereal quality.” Then compare/contrast the protagonist’s appearance.
Like I said above: good idea, poor execution.