Book Review - Accidents Happen - Louise Millar

Title: Accidents Happen

Author: Louise Millar

Review: Remember when you watched Hangover 1 and laughed you butt off?  Then they came out with Hangover 2 and you thought to yourself I can’t wait  to see what they do with these characters this time.  But then you saw it  and realized it was just the exact same movie as the first one but this  time it was in a foreign country with a tiny twig and berry shot.  SO what I am saying is if you read Louise Millar’s very good first book you will get that same feeling with her second effort.

While this book is fine it doesn’t really cover any new ground.  Basically you have a young woman with child fighting against unseen forces of baddies conspiring to destroy her life. The life lesson to take from her books is that if you are a woman you cannot under any circumstance take what you see as being the real story.  There are all sorts of nefarious individuals who are out to get you.  As the great Irish poet Paul Hewson once said; “No one is blinder than he who will not see.”

The sad part is Louise Millar is a very good writer and tells an excellent story.  It just seems she lacks the confidence to break free of her first novel and explore different themes.  She almost had it here if she had
spent more time digging into a woman struck by tragedy whose irrational fears are fed by statistical maxims.  While that may have not been a great book it definitely would have been unique and interesting.

So a good book but struggling with a repetitive theme.

Publisher: Emily Bestler Books
ISBN: 978-1-4516-5670-1
Copyright: 2013
Pages: 385
Quick Review:  3 stars out of 5
Why I Read It: Enjoyed her first book
Where I Obtained the Book: Sent to me by the publisher for review.

Synopsis: Kate Parker has weathered unimaginable horrors—her parents died in a traffic accident on her wedding night, and her husband, Hugo, was murdered in a tragic break-in gone wrong. All she has left is her young son, Jack, and determined to make a better future for him, she attempts to pull her life back together. But are she and her son safe?

Author Biography:  I am the author of The Playdate, a psychological thriller published by Pan Macmillan in the UK, and Emily Bestler Books in the USA. Before turning to fiction, I spent 20 years working in magazines and newspapers, starting as a freelance sub-editor on entertainment titles such as the NME, Kerrang!, Empire and Smash Hits, before crossing over into women’s magazines and becoming a senior commissioning editor at Marie Claire. In 2006, I left Marie Claire to start a business writing ‘ordinary people’s memoirs – appearing on BBC’s The One Show to promote it – while writing freelance features for Psychologies, the Observer, the Guardian, Stella (the Telegraph), Stylist and Marie Claire, and starting work on The Playdate. I live in London with my husband and children and am currently working on my second novel, Accidents Happen, which will be published in 2013.

Other Reviews:

Euro Crimes

Tina Marie Says