Review by Valentina Testa -- The Dark Web Murders
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Valentina Testa
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Review by Valentina Testa -- The Dark Web Murders
[Following is a volunteer review of "The Dark Web Murders" by Brian O'Hare.]
The Dark Web Murders by Brian O’Hare has all the right ingredients for a gripping murder mystery right from the first pages, where the reader is immediately confronted with an unfortunate manslaughter and learns about the first victim of the serial killer’s meticulous killing spree. The story that unfolds takes the perspective of an omniscient narrator that follows Chief Inspector Sheehan and his team’s investigation of the mounting murder cases in a frame increasingly abounding with suspects. The half-philosophical, half-gory blogs written by the assassin and uploaded on the Dark Web lead the reader inside the elusive villain’s head, with their flowing, affected prose describing and trying to justify the murders. That creates an incisive, subliminal cinematic effect of two sides facing each other for a challenge: the police looking for truth on one side, the secret murderer boasting on the Dark Web on the other.
The clues and suspense are dosed wisely in order to bring the reader to the final denouement with an unclear, yet specific, second-guessing of the identity of the murderer, very much in line with Inspector Sheehan’s. In this sense, a good job has been done with foreshadowing, and the parallel investigation, along with the obstinate search for a connection between the first group of suspects, managed to confuse me and attract my attention, just as it did with the investigative team. The feeling while reading The Dark Web Murders is that the reader is a physical part of the squad, thus unconsciously subject to their pervasive preconceptions and blunders as well.
The only struggle encountered during the reading has been keeping track of the countless characters, an issue that only Game of Thrones fans would be comfortable with. As much appreciated as it was, the list of the principal characters provided at the beginning of the book by the author did only minimally help in extricating my way through the maze of names and professions, mostly for the inconvenience of retrieving it by e-book. I trust in that a paper edition would have been handier to me, without in any way condemning the author’s gesture or choice of so many voices.
I personally did not find the gore the blurb referred to all that disturbing, seen as the description of said scenes was either done by forensic specialists in the detached frame of the investigation, or by the assassin themselves in their blog, where the prose was so pompous and 18th-Century-style that it failed to come across as actually gruesome. Only in a few instances towards the end did I feel real disgust, but I wouldn’t miss to recommend this book to averagely squeamish readers.
What I struggled a bit to accept was the ease with which the investigative team overlooked the last clue (plain to my untrained eyes), so as to further delay the final denouement. This, even though I don’t feel like it constitutes an actual plot hole, seen as it could be justified by the officers’ tenseness and expectation for a more arduous encrypted message, did puzzle me slightly.
All in all, I would rate this book 4 out of 4 for the captivating, well-spun story, and would recommend it to anyone looking for a good murder mystery and who’s not triggered by mentions of child sexual abuse, rape, torture and kidnapping (all dealt with with not too strong nor lurid details).
******
The Dark Web Murders
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
The Dark Web Murders by Brian O’Hare has all the right ingredients for a gripping murder mystery right from the first pages, where the reader is immediately confronted with an unfortunate manslaughter and learns about the first victim of the serial killer’s meticulous killing spree. The story that unfolds takes the perspective of an omniscient narrator that follows Chief Inspector Sheehan and his team’s investigation of the mounting murder cases in a frame increasingly abounding with suspects. The half-philosophical, half-gory blogs written by the assassin and uploaded on the Dark Web lead the reader inside the elusive villain’s head, with their flowing, affected prose describing and trying to justify the murders. That creates an incisive, subliminal cinematic effect of two sides facing each other for a challenge: the police looking for truth on one side, the secret murderer boasting on the Dark Web on the other.
The clues and suspense are dosed wisely in order to bring the reader to the final denouement with an unclear, yet specific, second-guessing of the identity of the murderer, very much in line with Inspector Sheehan’s. In this sense, a good job has been done with foreshadowing, and the parallel investigation, along with the obstinate search for a connection between the first group of suspects, managed to confuse me and attract my attention, just as it did with the investigative team. The feeling while reading The Dark Web Murders is that the reader is a physical part of the squad, thus unconsciously subject to their pervasive preconceptions and blunders as well.
The only struggle encountered during the reading has been keeping track of the countless characters, an issue that only Game of Thrones fans would be comfortable with. As much appreciated as it was, the list of the principal characters provided at the beginning of the book by the author did only minimally help in extricating my way through the maze of names and professions, mostly for the inconvenience of retrieving it by e-book. I trust in that a paper edition would have been handier to me, without in any way condemning the author’s gesture or choice of so many voices.
I personally did not find the gore the blurb referred to all that disturbing, seen as the description of said scenes was either done by forensic specialists in the detached frame of the investigation, or by the assassin themselves in their blog, where the prose was so pompous and 18th-Century-style that it failed to come across as actually gruesome. Only in a few instances towards the end did I feel real disgust, but I wouldn’t miss to recommend this book to averagely squeamish readers.
What I struggled a bit to accept was the ease with which the investigative team overlooked the last clue (plain to my untrained eyes), so as to further delay the final denouement. This, even though I don’t feel like it constitutes an actual plot hole, seen as it could be justified by the officers’ tenseness and expectation for a more arduous encrypted message, did puzzle me slightly.
All in all, I would rate this book 4 out of 4 for the captivating, well-spun story, and would recommend it to anyone looking for a good murder mystery and who’s not triggered by mentions of child sexual abuse, rape, torture and kidnapping (all dealt with with not too strong nor lurid details).
******
The Dark Web Murders
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Latest Review: Worldlines by Adam Guest
