Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Rock Paper Scissors by Alice Feeney

Amy  


thriller

Amelia and Adam are on a weekend retreat to try to salvage their marriage. Yet, from the beginning, the reader is made aware that Amelia is holding some secrets and Adam has his own plans. Told from both points of view, Rock Paper Scissors looks back over their ten years of marriage and also describes their current experiences during their getaway. Something is up, but what is it?

This novel did not immediately pull me in. The characters were not likable and there didn’t seem to be any big question or mystery other than what these characters might have up their sleeves in their separate efforts to sabotage the marriage reconciliation. Adam suffers from face blindness—unable to recognize people’s facial characteristics—and this fact felt like a contrived story device rather than a natural character trait. It forecasted the likelihood that the story would hinge on a situation where he would be unable to correctly identify someone. So, the most propelling aspect of the story for me during the first half was to see whether or not I was right about this plot point.

But the story did eventually grab my interest. I became more curious, in a car-accident sort of way, about what these two were planning to do to each other and what they had already done to each other. It turned out to be a “they deserve each other” sort of story and it wasn’t bad. I thought the ghost story aspects of it were fun. Alice Feeney succeeded in telling a creepy tale. I'm not sure I'd call it a thriller or a mystery but it is a mysterious drama.

I had heard these same two audiobook narrators, Richard Armitage and Stephanie Racine, in the other Alice Feeney novel I listened to. They did a nice job. Again, neither one was required to exhibit a very large voice repertoire but their voice acting was good—especially Racine’s. I’ll give them an A- as an ensemble.



   


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