📖 Book Review ~Unnatural Ends by Christopher Huang

 

Inkshares 
June 2023

My thanks to the publishers and Claire Maxwell for my copy of this book

Sir Lawrence Linwood is dead. More accurately, he was murdered—savagely beaten to death in his own study with a mediaeval mace. The murder calls home his three adopted children: Alan, an archeologist; Roger, an engineer; and Caroline, a journalist. But his heirs soon find that his last testament contains a strange proviso—that his estate shall go to the heir who solves his murder.

To secure their future, each Linwood heir must now dig into the past. As their suspicion mounts—of each other and of peculiar strangers in the churchless town of Linwood Hollow—they come to suspect that the perpetrator lurks in the mysterious origins of their own birth.

📖 My Review..

The book cover certainly captures the jigsaw nature of the murder mystery which is contained within its pages as this slow burning drama is characterised by several twists, turns and red herrings, all worthy of an interesting locked room mystery.

Returning to Linwood Hall, the adult children of Sir Lawrence Linwood, are faced with an impossible dilemma, as not only must they cope with the aftermath of their father's seemingly violent death but also as stipulated in his last will and testament the estate around Linwood Hall will be bequeathed to the child who solves his murder. As the story gets underway, we learn more about Alan, Roger and Caroline Linwood and of their unconventional upbringing by their tyrant of a father and the way in which their shared past influences their future going forward.

Unnatural Ends is a story of many parts, some of which are disturbing but the author's ability to recreate time and place is done well and the unnatural ends of the tale are accomplished with clear attention to detail and an ability to draw the reader into a story which is reminiscent of an Agatha Christie whodunit.

About the Author

Christopher Huang was born in Singapore. He migrated to Canada at the age of seventeen, but returned the following year to complete his two years of military service in the Singapore Army. He studied Architecture at McGill University, and lived for many years in Montreal, Quebec, before moving to Calgary, Alberta.

Twitter @misericordius #UnnaturalEnds

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