Hangman by Jack Heath

I've always been a massive fan of Paul Cleave's writing and his novel THE CLEANER ticked so many boxes for me, considerably more than the Dexter franchise in which the first novel was okay, but things went downhill when the violence became too gory and it was hard to avoid a sinking feeling of sensationalism. When it comes to sensationalism though I reckon HANGMAN has it all over every single book that it's obviously a homage to ... in blood soaked, gore dripping, dented from over-use, spades.

This is obviously going to be a novel that polarises readers. I get there's humour attempted here, I get that the over the topness is part of the "thing", and I fully acknowledge that I obviously missed the joke, or the overtness just didn't work for me. I pretty much rolled my eyes, harrumphed and sighed my way through the entire thing. The twist was easy to guess, the storyline felt overtly manipulative, the plot holes and logic gaps not sufficiently compensated for, and I still can't work out how on earth the female FBI agent ever qualified because she comes across as too dumb to find her shoes, let alone tie her laces. On the upside the humour, if it works for you, and the over the top nature of it, if it works for you, will undoubtedly make some readers very happy with this novel.