Review: More of a novel than a mystery
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 04 27, 2012
This is not a Mystery. It's a novel about Malaysia, an unhappy couple, miserable children and the life on a plantation. The fact that someone dies and Diane (the sleuth in Assassins' village) is reading diaries does not a Mystery make.For a book to be in the Mystery genre, it needs at least a) a crime b) a detective actively detecting,  c) a believable motive for the crime and d) the detective should catch the culprit and justice is rendered.None of those elements are present in this novel. The crime is introduced at the very end, reading is not detecting by any definition, the motive for the crime is ridiculous, the ending is flat and unsatisfying and the final twist laughable.Now, it would have been a much better book if the author had chosen to simply write a novel. Because really, all the elements that are extraneous to crime-solving are the main gist. As such, it's not too bad although, for my taste, none of the characters are pleasant or likable.If you're looking for a mystery, you might be very disappointed.