mood music: Secrets – the weeknd
Yet again, I find myself in the minority opinion after my latest “read.” I chose to listen to the audiobook version of this title while nursing a cold, and while the first third of the story was intriguing and well-paced, the latter two-thirds fell apart for me in a way that I had to read a summary to understand what happened at the end. To me, it felt like there were a lot of plot points that were left unresolved in a way that I found not just confusing but pointless filler to lengthen the story, and the central crutch of the story becomes a nonissue by the end, which made the build-up to the confrontation fall very flat.
Evie Porter is a twenty-something-year-old woman living in a small town in Louisiana. Her boyfriend, Ryan, is the well-known golden boy around town, and their relationship has moved hot and fast as they are moving in together after only four months of dating. Evie does her best to ingratiate herself with Ryan’s close circle of friends, even if she doesn’t care for all the judgment they pass on her as the outsider, to prove that she isn’t what they believe her to be – a golddigger after his newly inherited wealth and business following his grandfather’s passing. What Ryan doesn’t know is that Evie isn’t who she says she is at all. Matter of fact, her name isn’t even really Evie, that’s the alias she’s living under for her new assignment from her boss, the elusive Mr. Smith. The target of the job is none other than Ryan, and Evie has to play the doting girlfriend long enough to uncover the information that Mr. Smith wants on Ryan’s business.
Except…that’s only one plot in this story. This alone could have filled up the entire story. Instead, Elston adds in two other plot points that turn a solid beginning into a convoluted mess by the end. I didn’t have an issue with the flashbacks to Evie’s previous jobs, but it felt like some of them were inconsequential to moving the story along. I didn’t need to know about the time she was undercover as a sitter, it served no purpose except to show that she has a history of growing attached to her targets. Also, time and again we are told by Evie’s employers that the reason they chose her to join this undercover operation after following her career as a petty thief and scammer, was that they felt she had a skill set that would be beneficial to their organization. Except for time and again, Evie is shown to be quite sloppy and allows herself to be nearly caught on more than one occasion, even after her boss threatens to terminate her if she doesn’t tighten up her act.
I feel gaslit by the reviews of this book. One in particular called it “ingeniously plotted” and I would heartedly disagree with that description. I’m giving this a 2.5/5, rounding up on here to 3, only for the solid first 11 chapters which drew me in and made me excited for what would happen next. I wish it had maintained that same momentum and tempo thematically, but unfortunately, I’m not sure that I could recommend this as an entertaining thriller, its more like a very watered down version of the TV show Alias.