When a teenager’s decomposed body is discovered outside Cambridge, England, Detective Inspector Chloe Frohmann and her partner must work with very little clues in order to identify the body. When the person who provides the first break in the case ends up dead herself, the detectives must work quickly to solve the ever-widening case. As the complicated story begins to unfold, the detectives traverse the streets of Cambridge and eventually settle upon Deeping House as the possible scene of the crime. A country manor now used as an apartment building, Deeping House is filled with a variety of complex characters each with secrets to hide.
The Start of Everything by Emily Winslow is an interesting tale of whodunit. Filled with a rather large cast of suspects, The Start of Everything is a page-turning psychological thriller complete with a shocking final plot twist.
Author Emily Winslow is an American currently living in England. During college at Carnegie Mellon, Winslow trained as an actress in the school’s elite drama program. Winslow has also spent many years designing puzzles for Games magazine. Both of these experiences are very evident in her novel, The Start of Everything. Each character in this book is unique from the other as each character narrates different chapters in their own first-person voice. Similarly, the plot of The Start of Everything is woven together like the complex puzzles that Winslow specializes in designing.
With such a strong emphasis on detailed characters and twisting plot turns, The Start of Everything can be confusing. Each person in this novel has several secret agendas and certainly not all of the facts are relevant to the case at hand. A few of the connections between the characters do feel a bit contrived. The odd connections could also be a result of clues that can be easily missed amongst the novel’s complicated plot. If readers stick with the book, however, the book does lead to a unique and surprising ending as the pieces of the puzzle come together.
The Start of Everything by Emily Winslow is definitely for those who enjoy a crime drama with a complex cast of characters and numerous plot twists.
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