Untouchable by Sibel Hodge.

Maya Morgan, 37 has been living happily with her boyfriend Jamie Talyor in his home at Tyttenhanger, near St. Albans for six months when suddenly he does not come home from work one evening. Has something gone wrong? Is there a reason for Jamie’s delay from work? Find out the truth behind Jamie’s disappearance in this British crime thriller.

There were some nice bits in this story early on like the dialogue shared between Maya and her sister Ava. The way they spoke to each other reminded me very much of Ellie and Izzi, sisters who appear week after week on the successful British Channel 4 television programme Gogglebox.

Untouchable is a first person narrative with a difference. The reader starts this novel from Maya’s point of view, in the first person and the current day. Then we have alternating chapters between Maya in the current day and Jamie in his childhood decades ago ALL told in the first person. This is followed by Jamie dropping out of the story to be continued by Maya in the current day ALSO in the first person. But then, new guy on the block, Mitchell gets his chapters to tell his current day story in the first person. This shifting focus is a disappointment leading to frustration as I worked through this novel. I did not like the format in which this story was told.

This story got off with the alarm bells ringing when Maya got home from work. But then the reader was thrown into the position of knowing more than Maya did because you discovered Jamie’s back story. I found this very frustrating for a first person narrative.

I found Untouchable very run of the mill. We had the usual tales of historic child abuse, conspiracy, lies, media restrictions, politics and wealthy people getting away with murder. No surprises were sprung on the reader as Maya and Mitchell got to the bottom of this sorry tale. Although this novel featured historic child abuse, there was nothing in the script that would shock your grandmother. There was nothing in this tale that would excite a paedophile.

 

I found Untouchable to be a drag and full of cliches. I thought Mitchell was an unrealistic hero. I lacked empathy for Maya and wondered why she did not simply let sleeping dogs lie as she was clearly out of her depth but financially secure. I thought Untouchable lacked entertainment value and was a disappointing POOR read that gets just 2 stars from me.

Untouchable was written in 2016 and is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook.