bookish devices

Title: Playing with Fire

Author: Tess Gerritsen

Rating:  4 stars

Reviewer: Jennifer

I’ve only read Ms. Gerritsen’s Rizzoli and Isles series and have absolutely loved them. While Playing with Fire is a departure from that, I did find it to be a really quick and enjoyable read.

Julia Ansdell picks up “The Incendio Waltz,” while on a trip. When she sees it for the first time, she knows it’s an unusual composition. Once back home, while playing the piece, Julia blacks out and awakens to find her young daughter implicated in acts of surprising violence. Was Julia’s daughter really acting out and intentionally harming her? I found this aspect of the story intriguing and creepy. I imagined what my reaction might be if I thought my child were harming me … and that freaked me out.

When Julia travels to Venice to find the previous owner of the music, she uncovers a dark secret that involves dangerously powerful people—a family who would stop at nothing to keep Julia from bringing the truth to light. Um … sounds like a big part of the story doesn’t it? I didn’t think so. It was not well done in my opinion. It felt slapped together and wrapped up too quickly with not enough of the details the rest of the story was given.

There is also the story of Lorenzo and Laura. I enjoyed their story as well, finding it believable and interesting.

While there was that one aspect of the story I couldn’t quite believe, I found myself not being able to turn the pages fast enough because I wanted to know what was next.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.