The Inmate is another implausible, yet strangely compelling, thriller from Freida McFadden.
A single mother named Brooke Sullivan has returned to her hometown with her son and moved into her recently deceased parents’ house. She gets a job as a nurse practitioner at a nearby prison where a murderous ex-boyfriend is incarcerated. Brooke reconnects with a childhood friend who was also almost killed by the seemingly sociopathic Shane Nelson. The strange reunion occurs, and Brooke has some reason to doubt her memories of that traumatic night eleven years earlier. Shane is in prison because of her courageous testimony, but Brooke is suddenly doubting herself, especially when another murder occurs.
The novel is written in first person from Brooke’s point of view and often alternates between the present day and eleven years earlier.
McFadden seems to; rely on quite a bit of coincidence as usual. Brooke’s judgment is kind of questionable, which is tempting for me to have limited sympathy. It then occurs to me that my judgment in romantic relationships hasn’t exactly been all that stellar either, although I have not been involved in any gruesome murders, just to be clear.
There are a few twists that are a little hard to buy into, but McFadden did manage to keep me interested in spite of my admittedly mild exasperation.
McFadden is an imaginative and pretty competent writer. I have no real objection to her prose style because the story does flow pretty easily.
In spite of my skepticism I experienced, I did like the novel overall. I am still kind of new to McFadden’s works, but I have enjoyed the few that I have read.
Next up is something which is complete nostalgic fluff. I have decided to try out one of the Murder, She Wrote novels which have been published for many years now. Jessica Fletcher has a new murder to solve while taking a trip down memory lane as she and Jon Land relate the events of A Time for Murder.
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