Art director Jackie Seow’s book cover depicts a woman in a dimly-lit park at night – a far better choice than the prosaic bloody glass slipper one might have expected to find on a story with this title.
It shows some thought has gone into the presentation as well as the writing.
Set in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles, the premise of an investigative TV show looking into cold cases makes for an interesting alternative to the stock-standard format of brilliant, but melancholy detective (or determined lawyer) digging up old bones from cold cases their predecessors never solved.
Laurie Moran and her team from the Under Suspicion TV show set about re-interviewing friends, family and lecturers of Susan Dempsey, found murdered in a park near the location of her proposed audition for a movie role, two decades before. The body is found minus one shoe – hence the novel’s title.
The suspect list is varied and though the characters have undergone some change over the years, they revert to type as Moran starts delving. This results in several unexpected plot twists and a couple of murders aimed at covering past wrongdoings. The reader is kept guessing until the climax neatly ties up all the loose ends.
As the second in the series, this book stands comfortably on its own, so the reader is not left feeling they should have read the first book to get a feel for the series, or that the authors have contrived to put them in the picture.
The Cinderella Murder is written by Mary Higgins Clark and Alafair Burke, and published by Simon and Schuster