Hello friends and fellow bookworms! I’m here today to bring you my review of The Dead Hand of Dominique by Simon Marlowe. I was lucky to receive a free copy from NetGalley and Cranthorpe Millner Publishers in return for an honest review.
You can also read the synopsis of The Dead Hand of Dominique here on Goodreads and it was published on the 23rd November 2021.
Overall rating – 3 out of 5 stars.
I’ve rated The Dead Hand of Dominque as 3 stars because it just felt average to me, there were parts that I really enjoyed and parts that I felt let the book down and going straight down the middle felt the only fair way to rate this book.
The writing was the best part of this book for me, despite the slow burn nature of this story the author kept us interested and built sentences and paragraphs that hooked you like a fish on a line. I couldn’t fault the writing itself, it was high quality and had everything you could want to grab your attention and make you read the book.
That being said, I did feel at points that the author introduced too many strands of the story and it became quite difficult to keep up. I struggled to see how everything could come together in a way that would give us the answers we needed.
My other favourite part of this book was the characters, which surprised me a little bit as they didn’t seem like the focal point of the story. Steven took the lead role and narrated the story, and I did find myself drawn to him. He was an incredibly interesting and complex person and his narration of the story was part of the reason I enjoyed this book. However, I did feel that the other characters weren’t as well developed and didn’t add as much value. which isn’t a criticism as I don’t feel like the characters were meant to be the focal point.
I did enjoy that the other characters weren’t as well developed though, because it meant I could focus on the plot and the story and really try and piece together what was happening.
The plot itself was (for the first 75/80%) was brilliant, it was convoluted in the best way and really worked to lead us on a wild goose chase! But, when we reached the final 20% of the book it just undid everything that I’d just read… It just became confusing, in the worst way possible and I don’t feel like we ever reached a proper conclusion.
I finished the book feeling very let down and unsure about what had actually happened to end the book. Plus, certain parts of the book weren’t wrapped up properly, which really bugged me.
One of the things the author did incredibly well though was to keep the intrigue building for the entire story. Because we were being led on this wild ride it was hard not to be incredibly intrigued by the whole thing!
But, the atmosphere did let this book down, and I feel that was due to the slow pace of the story. It felt like I had to really be in the mood to read this book, which is why it took me so long to read it. It wasn’t something I could just pick up and relax which, you had to really concentrate otherwise you would have lost track.
Overall, The Dead Hand of Dominique did have it’s elements that were incredible, like the plot and the characters, but it’s actual entertainment value and the final 20% of the book just let it down for me and weren’t what I would have expected.
Until next time, Em xxx
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