[My comments are taken from a mailing list discussion and as such contain spoilers!]

[on the characters]

I may be forgetting something essential but I don’t remember there being any recurring characters other than Kolla and Brock.

I thought Brock was better developed in this book because he had a bigger role to play and more of the book was written from his point of view. In _The Marx Sisters_ Brock was quite sketchy and here we learnt more about his past and his home. I think everything here was consistent with what we knew before though I’m wondering about the woman in the red sports car who was seen with Brock in the first book as I don’t think there was any hint of her here.

I also thought what we saw of Kathy was consistent with what we already knew too. I didn’t think the rest of the cast were quite as interesting as the people in the first investigation, I read the book last week and I’ve already forgotten most of them which didn’t happen so fast with the first book. I liked the characters round the edges of the investigation better than the ones in the middle of it.

It’s not a character as such but I liked the way architecture played a role just as it did in the first book, I hope that’s a recurring theme throughout the rest of the series. (I think the bio in the front says that Maitland is an professor of architecture?)

[on the plot]

This is one of those books where I find myself nodding at everyone else’s replies about how implausible parts of the plot were but at the same time feel that it worked for me. I liked Kolla and Brock going out on their own and thought Dowling’s role was worked in pretty well.

Yes, David in particular did numerous things that weren’t exactly becoming to his rank but I could believe in his actions because he was bored with the work he was doing and detached from his regualr policework. I thought Kathy’s behaviour fit with what we’ve seen before. Tanner handing the investigation off to Kolla is probably the most implausible part of the book for me though I think he was just being arrogant and faced with an investigation that *had* to be screwed up thought he could take an out of area detective sergeant that he disliked down with it.

The moment where I thought the plot was losing it was at the conclusion of Act One when Kathy is told to close down the investigation. This was so similar to what happened in the first book in the series that I wondered if Maitland was running out of plot devices already. It was done differently and for entirely different reasons but the echo of the first book was a bit loud for me.

I liked the resolution on the whole. I was glad it was Brock who walked into danger and not Kolla and also glad that it wasn’t deliberate as Kolla’s actions in the first book were.

[on the setting]

I did like the setting and found the hospital quite a believable place. It wasn’t as outstanding as scenery as Jerusalem Lane was but I thought it had a lot going for it, especially the temple and the links to The Malcontenta.

I’m not very good at remembering individual scenes but a few that stand out to me are: The part of the book where Kathy and David were in Italy and David introduces her as his niece - I thought that was a neat way of showing the age difference between them and the attraction between them at the same time; The scenes where Kathy was taken off the case by Tanner - partially I thought this was too reminiscent of book one but mainly I was seething for Kathy; I liked the parts with Kathy’s housemates, the way that Brock knew her neighbours before she did reminded me far too much of places that I’ve known; The final part with Kathy having to kill Tanner was a little over the top, I thought a lower key ending would have been more plausible.

[compared to the previous book]

I liked it just as much as the first book, I thought it was stronger in some areas and weaker in others. The setting wasn’t as overpowering in this book and the investigated characters weren’t as strongly drawn but I think that gave this book a chance to be more balanced and to develop the two main characters more.

I like the architecture theme a lot, I probably prefered it for being a bit more backgrounded in this book though.

[in summary]

Overall I really liked this book. I’m definitely looking forward to the next two books and expect that I will go on to read the others too. I’m not sure that I’d recommend the series to anyone who would be concerned about plausibility but I’m really enjoying it.