Kind of Cruel

By: Sophie Hannah

Narrated by: Emma Kay, Jonathan Aris, Anna Bentinck

Shortlisted for: Crime & Thriller of the Year – Specsavers National Book Awards 2012

When Amber Hewerdine consults a hypnotherapist as a desperate last resort, she doesn't expect that anything much will change. She doesn't expect it to help with her chronic insomnia. And she doesn't expect to hear herself, under hypnosis, saying words that mean nothing to her: 'Kind, cruel, kind of cruel'. These are words she has seen somewhere before, if only she could remember where….

She also doesn't expect to be arrested two hours later, as a result of having spoken those words out loud, in connection with the brutal murder of Katharine Allen, a woman she's never heard of.

©2012 Sophie Hannah (P)2012 Hodder & Stoughton

Convoluted tedium

A convoluted plot - that becomes ever more tortured - is overlaid with a cast of judgmental characters who never use one word when 10 will do in this endurance test of a book. Smug, self satisfied preaching is no substitute for imaginative engagement.