A review of Close by Martina Cole

I never thought I would do this, a review of a book by an established author in the traditional publishing industry but this book epitomises the worst of that industry. I’m really into self published books now but read them on my desktop computer, a bit difficult in bed. So for my bedtime reading I tend to read second-hand books which I can buy in my local village here in Spain. There isn’t a great deal of choice but they are better than nothing. I’ve read a couple of books by Martina Cole who is described as a No 1 Bestseller. She tends to write gritty crime dramas and CLOSE is no exception. It’s about an East end London crime family from the 1960s to almost the present day.

CLOSE is 663 pages of quantity not quality. A mediocre story is dragged out with so many repetitions it became very annoying. For instance, when the main character, Lil Brodie's second child is born, she immediately feels the child, Lance, is odd and she doesn't bond with him, however her feckless mother Annie does. That piece of information is repeated throughout the book about twenty five times, not only that but the whys and wherefores too. This novel could easily have been half the length and it would not have spoilt the story. I've read other books by Martina and they are good but this later novel, number twelve I believe is a let down. Martina Cole must be surrounded by a team of professionals, editors, literary agents and publishers, how they let her get away with this I don't understand. It seems she has run out of new ideas as so many established authors do.

That is why I started www.booksandnovelstoread.com so that fresh new self published authors can come to the attention of the book reading public. You don’t have to put up with this trash!!!!!

One other thing, the language in this book is appalling. Now in my novel The Catalytic Programme there is some bad language, appropriate to the characters and scene. In CLOSE there is barely a paragraph goes by without profanity, way over the top and I’m sure this would spoil a dire book even more.