Review:Thirteen by Steve Cavanagh I received a free ecopy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks to Netgalley and Orion publishing for the opportunity. I hadn’t read and Steve Cavanagh before this, and when I realised this was book 4 of a series I was a little concerned. Jumping in mid-series can result in a couple of problems, either you can’t keep up because you don’t know the backstory, or it is replete with spoilers that ruin the earlier books for you. There was enough detail here that I could get a feel for the hero, Eddie Flynn’s character and life, but the previous books remain largely a mystery to me. In brief, Eddie is. Conman turned defence lawyer who gets drawn into a celeb in murder case. However, all is not as it seems. The real murderer manipulates his way onto the jury so that he can affect the verdict for his own ends. The narrative alternates between Eddie (written in the first person) and the killer (written in the third person). This is a neat trick, that I’ve come across before means you don’t get the two mixed up. I appreciate the effort as that is often a problem for me in multi-narrative books. The murderer in this book is unashamedly evil, knocking off people with a cheerful abandon that gave me chills. It is. Mark of Cavanagh’s writing skill that my stomach churned each time it switched to his viewpoint. Eddie was the perfect counterpoint. Though a lawyer he displayed the requisite tired, romantically challenged nature of your standard novelised detective. As a former con-ma, though, he opens up the court scenes for us, breaking down the theatricality of a game of bait and switch. Naturally, as a con-man, he knows the game. The real bait and switch, however, is in the plot and I have to say, I never saw it coming. Not done with messing with the reader’s head, the author throws in a further twist before the end, which is just the cherry on top. A worthy thriller that earned its 4 stars and made me want read the earlier books as soon as possible.
