Great debut for the most part, 2 drawbacks

For the most part, this is an exceptional thriller debut. Cleverly done, both the plotting and the way the author sets the (vivid) scene.

Two drawbacks, both unfortunate/unnecessary:

1) Credibility/plot problem *** [spoiler alert]
The way this is done here, no reader will seriously believe that the protagonist did it herself. In the beginning, when the author merely subtly hints at this possibility, it's fine. In part interesting even. The moment the author launches into giving the protagonist the actual believe that she did it, all credibility is lost, however. Suspense and timing are lost with it, because we know she did not do it, so just read on to get to the next part (if we are invested enough in the story to read on). Dear author... if you really want us to believe that your protagonist did it herself, then give her an actual anger problem instead of letting her so obviously be misdiagnosed as a child. (That part is done quite unconvincingly as well, by the way.) I understand the author's temptation to further explore the 'protagonist falsely blames herself' plotline, but this has been done so many times before and is so hard to pull off convincingly - resisting that temptation would have elevated the book to another level.

2) Narrator's limits
The narrator does a good job with the protagonist's voice, but the other characters should have been narrated by another voice-actor. Some narrators can pull off different voices/characters, but here, that doesn't work unfortunately. There is little difference between any of the 'voices', to be honest. The male voices/characters are particularly unconvincing.

Still a good read and a good listen, just two unfortunate drawbacks.

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