Title: A Window Breaks
Author: C.M. Ewan
Publisher: Pan Macmillan
[Synopsis]
If your family was targeted in the middle of the night, what would you do?
You are asleep. A noise wakes you.
You stir, unsure why, and turn to your wife.
Then you hear it.
Glass. Crunching underfoot.
Your worst fears are about to be realized.
Someone is inside your home.
Your choices are limited.
You can run. Or stay and fight.
What would you do?
[My Review]
A Window Breaks is a fast-paced thriller, packed full of tension. The story starts a little slower but soon the action ramps up, and once it does it doesn’t let up!
We follow Tom and his family (wife Rachel and daughter Holly) as they go on a short break away together to a friend’s forest lodge, having had a very tough year – and see things go bad very quickly. They have masked men after them but they don’t know why – but we slowly start to learn more about their pasts and what may have caused these men to come after them. There are various elements which start to become entwined and I really enjoyed trying to figure out what was going on (I didn’t guess correctly, but it was fun all the same).
For the most part the writing kept my attention despite it being basically all action for the last 3/4 of the book (which often would have me struggling to stay focused). I do think the scenes where they were being chased around the lodge could have been a bit shorter – I started to lose interest a bit as it felt like too many hiccups, one after the other, but it wasn’t a huge problem. We learn more about their late son Michael and his girlfriend through short sections which take us back in time to before his death, and through these we learn more about what really happened to them. Apart from this, however, I felt like we didn’t learn a huge deal about the rest of the characters; this book definitely focuses on action rather than character development – and that’s fine; I feel that it works well in this style of novel. I also don’t think the conclusion was too far-fetched – you might have to suspend your disbelief but not to the point that it impacts enjoyment of the story (or not for me, anyway).
Because it’s such an easy read, I raced through it in no time and so I’d recommend A Window Breaks to anyone looking for a fast-paced, thrilling read which has action as its focus. It’s a fun, absorbing read.
[Rating: 4/5]
Many thanks to the publisher, Pan Macmillan, for providing a copy of this book on which I chose to write an honest and unbiased review.
Great review