‘Someone Who Isn’t Me’ by Danuta Kot is a crime novel. I haven’t read anything by Danuta Kot previously, so I had no expectations. Let me say now, I will expect excellent books from this author in the future as I thought this was an expertly crafted story.
It is set in and around the North Yorkshire coast. Becca is just managing to hold her life together, her money is tight but she is really trying to stay independent and not lean on her foster mum, Kay. She holds down two jobs, a barmaid in the local pub and the other in a supermarket. She is seeing Andy, who keeps himself to himself but he is still a good laugh.
The day arrives that Andy disappears and his body is found on Sunk Island, an isolated place. Then Becca discovers Andy was an undercover copper and the repercussions of this are about to echo down to Becca as DC Dinah Mason is determined to find out what happened to Andy. Finding out that he was an undercover copper has deeply affected her and she turns to Kay, the only person she trusts. Kay has just moved out to Sunk Island and is hoping to have peace and quiet,
but her neighbour is worrying her with claims of strange nocturnal activity and odd sounds… sounds like Kay has enough on her hands with Becca’s issues too.
A brilliantly written character-driven story that is almost like a spiders web, with multiple threads that all interconnect and weave a story with all the characters overlapping with each other to give us an intriguing and suspenseful book.
This is a story of people and how we all react when faced with a variety of situations in life. We see them warts and all, which I liked. It is not all sunshine and happiness all the time and I thought that Danuta Kot has expertly given us a set of characters that aren’t all likeable but even they have some redeeming qualities about them.
This is almost a study of the grittiness of the North and the reality of living in a declining industrial town or city here. I connected immediately and understood the message. The drugs and the crime that are slowly eroding the hope especially for the young. There is still some hope which we see in Becca’s determination to handle her problems and get on in life. Her foster mum helps others and the policewoman who wants to discover who killed Andy. The hope is there still.
Thank you to Random Things Tours and Danuta Kot for my copy of the book.
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