Jason Brody is back on the beat as a private detective, but his professional life is overshadowed by a personal mission: finding his ex-wife, Tessa. The woman he believed was an archaeologist and his second wife turned out to be a con artist who emptied his bank account and vanished. While the funds from his French house sale arrived shortly after her escape, Brody can’t shake the feeling of being deceived. This personal quest for closure intertwines with his current client case in Leeds, which involves tracing adopted parents.
The narrative takes an immediate turn with a dramatic rescue of a Jack Russell terrier from an abusive owner. This event coincides with Jason becoming a dog owner himself. Simultaneously, a former police officer working as a supermarket security guard intervenes to save a young girl from her drug-addicted prostitute mother. The security guard, Trixie, recognizes the mother from her previous police work, aware of her history of having multiple children who were subsequently placed under guardianship. While the act of buying a child is ethically questionable, the story suggests that such actions might be permissible when undertaken by a well-intentioned single woman.
Meanwhile, an elderly actress named Tilly grapples with senile dementia. Despite her cognitive decline, she lands a role as the protagonist’s mother in a crime series. However, her grip on reality is loosening, and her storyline primarily consists of memories of a youthful friendship with Phoebe, a celebrated actress. In the seventies, Phoebe allegedly stole Tilly’s lover, a fashion director. Tilly also reflects on a lost romance with a Zimbabwean embassy employee from her youth, a relationship that ended due to a mishap involving an abortion at a late stage, which prevented Tilly from having more children after the death of her Black infant.
The novel explores the common parental suffering stemming from children’s rudeness, indifference, and misunderstanding, contrasted with the desire of those without children to experience these very things. Brody, along with his new dog, finds himself entangled in various predicaments. The plot then delves into a thirty-year-old cold case: police discovering a severely malnourished young boy in the apartment of a deceased prostitute and drug addict, following a neighbor’s complaint about a foul odor.
Ultimately, the author masterfully weaves these disparate threads together, delivering a resolution where justice is served, wrongs are righted, and the deserving are rewarded. However, the significance of Tilly’s role in the broader narrative remains somewhat unclear. Similarly, Trixie’s unwavering determination to keep the child she acquired, despite the ethical ambiguities, strains credulity. The underlying sentiment suggests a grim reality: law enforcement officers are not fundamentally different from the individuals they are tasked with protecting the public from—both are predatory in their own ways.
This installment, the fourth in Kate Atkinson’s series featuring Jason Brody, may signal a point for readers to take a brief hiatus from the author’s work. While the compelling nature of the series makes one hesitant to stop, the novel is perceived as “very good” rather than an absolute “wow.” This suggests pausing before diving into the final book, perhaps until a darker mood strikes. The initial interest in Atkinson’s writing was sparked by a “clever” Litres promotion that led to listening to the first book, prompting a return to the beginning of the series. The previous books provided a delightful escape, a welcome distraction from the current news cycle and a tool for achieving a sense of harmony.
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