Kind of Cruel

June 17, 2013
Hannah’s addictive seventh psychological thriller featuring husband-and-wife Det. Constable Simon Waterhouse and Det. Sgt. Charlie Zailer (after 2012’s The Other Woman’s House) explores the differences between feelings and memories. Insomniac Amber Hewerdine’s visit to a hypnotherapist in Silsford, England, leads to her involvement in the investigation of the murder of Katharine Allen, a primary school teacher. At the crime scene is a piece of paper with the enigmatic words of the title. Oddly, the police decide to treat Amber not as a suspect, but almost as a colleague. An earlier murder, by arson, of Amber’s best friend, raises the tension. Readers will begin to wonder how much of what the characters say can be believed. As Amber notes, “A connection in my mind isn’t the same thing as a connection in the real world.” The key to the mystery involves divining the meaning of the words on the piece of paper. A creepy subplot involves some of the most evil mothers in contemporary fiction.

June 15, 2013
British writer Hannah, who specializes in psychological thrillers, continues her series centered around two married police detectives, officers Simon Waterhouse and Charlie Zailer. Amber Hewerdine visits a hypnotherapist seeking help sleeping at night. Although a skeptic, she's been suffering from insomnia for so long that she's desperate for a good night's sleep. While there, the acerbic Amber meets Zailer, a police officer who is halfheartedly trying to quit smoking. Through a confusing series of events, Amber says several odd things to the hypnotherapist, including the words, "Kind, Cruel, Kind of Cruel." Those words have special significance to both Waterhouse and Zailer since their imprint was found on a pad of paper discovered at the murder scene where Katharine Allen, a primary teacher, was discovered bludgeoned to death. Waterhouse immediately sees the significance of Amber knowing this unreleased detail and has a fellow officer bring her in for questioning. Amber has a strange past of her own: Her best friend, Sharon, was killed in a fire, and she has custody of the woman's two small daughters, who escaped the blaze. Add to this a peculiar extended family, an odd night that took place in a rented house and another fire, then mix in some bizarre police work, and you'll get Hannah's sometimes-confusing, overly complex tale. Part of the problem is that Hannah peoples her story with unlikable characters: The police officers spend most of their time stomping around, name-calling and screaming about office politics and their personal lives. Back and forth shifts in time and the multiple narrators may confound and alienate readers.

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Starred review from May 1, 2013
Chronic insomnia drives Amber Hewerdine to the clinic of hypnotherapist Ginny Saxon, where a bizarre encounter with DS Charlie Zailer involves Amber in a murder investigation. Amber has a memory of seeing the words Kind. Cruel. Kind of Cruel on a lined sheet of paper linked to the murder of Katharine Allen that DC Simon Waterhouse, Charlie's husband, is working on, and she's sure that if she can remember the source of the paper, she can solve the murder. Along with her husband, Luke, Amber has guardianship of the two daughters of her best friend, who died in an arson-related fire years earlier, a case that's still open. While a colleague suspects Amber of both murders, Simon is somewhat taken with her, poking holes in her stories, delving into her extended family, and bouncing theories off her. Italicized accounts from Ginny begin and end the book and are interspersed throughout, explaining the psychology of the various characters and the roles of repression, denial, and secrecy in what is happening. Lighter on police procedure than some of Hannah's novels, this is brilliantly executed psychological suspense with a complex plot brought to a horribly logical conclusion.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)

February 15, 2013

With this seventh psychological crime novel starring Det. Simon Waterhouse and Sgt. Charlie Zailer, Hannah breaks out in hardcover--about time, since she's been winning awards and selling around the world. The premise is typically Hannah-creepy. Upset when arson kills her best friend and still puzzled about the unexplained disappearance and sudden reappearance of four of her family members one Christmas, Amber Hewerdine undergoes hypnotherapy, uttering words that lead to her arrest for murder. Her words: "Kind, cruel, kind of cruel."

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 1, 2013

Amber Hewerdine, suffering from insomnia since the murder of a close friend, decides to try hypnotherapy in the hope of solving the problem. In her first session, while hypnotized, she makes a statement to the therapist: "Kind, cruel, kind of cruel." She senses that this phrase relates to the murder and becomes further convinced when she spots the same words on a notebook held by a fellow hypnotherapy client. That client turns out to be Sgt. Charlie Zailer, whose husband is Det. Simon Waterhouse, and Amber is soon drawn into a murder investigation. In this latest installment in the Zailer and Waterhouse mysteries (after The Dead Lie Down), Hannah spins a dark tale of a woman haunted by subconscious memories. The story is engaging, although the use of too many characters is confusing at times. The ending is unfortunately convoluted, as the author attempts to wrap up every plot detail in the final pages. VERDICT Marking her hardcover debut with Putnam, Hannah's latest is an intriguing thriller for fans of psychological suspense, but the sloppy ending is likely to disappoint many readers. [See Prepub Alert, 1/25/13.]--Linda Oliver, MLIS, Colorado Springs

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.