Fiona Quinn, author of the novel Weakest Lynx, is also the author of the truly wonderful Thrill Writing blog, which I read regularly. It’s a compendium of factual interviews with experts in areas that a writer of thrillers may need to know for his or her books.
As a fan of her blog and follower of hers on twitter, I saw the publicly-posted encouragement to vote for her novel Weakest Lynx in the Kindle Scout program. This action I undertook with alacrity, because her blog provides such great research I figured the resulting novel had to be good. As often happens with the Kindle Scout program (remember this, when I ask you to vote for my books!) I later received a coupon from Amazon to get Ms. Quinn’s book half-off, after it was successful in the Kindle Scout program.
Armed with a 50% discount and a fresh out of the box replacement Kindle, I settled in to read a book that was a bit outside my personal comfort zone, but was also a master class in the art of suspense.
I found myself looking away from the Kindle, afraid to know what happened next. I found myself trying to peek at the Kindle out the corner of my eye, so I could find out what happened next but be in a good position to look away again if it was too scary. But most of all, I found myself pulled back to the story constantly because the author succeeded in creating a villain who I really wanted to see get his just desserts.
One should know upfront, this novel contains elements I don’t usually read. There was a fair amount of describing our heroine’s state of undress, and I don’t usually read about psychic stuff unless it comes in a spiritual context that I completely trust. But the sympathetic nature of the heroine, the villain who richly deserved a bad fate, and the suspense about how those two interacted covered over all that.
I recommend Weakest Lynx, but read it in the daytime!