The Other Passenger by Louise Candlish

Suzie Eisfelder

One of the books sold to me by Helena’s Curiosity Shop. I’ve done really well with recommendations from bookshop workers. Out of all the recommendations I’ve had in the past three years there’s only been one I’ve been unhappy with. I’m told it’s a good book, but I just can’t get into it. The Other Passenger, on the other hand, I struggled to put down. I read way past the time I should have put my book down on several occasions.

I felt drawn to the lead character in this book. I don’t know why, he’s quite open about cheating on his partner, and he’s cheating with a friend of theirs. Despite this he seemed really likeable. But he’s also got other faults. He’s got no money, lives with his partner who is really well off. He had some time off work for health reasons. On returning to work he’s ended up as a barrista in the city. He seems to like the job, but feels other people think he should be getting a job in his previous field where he can earn more money.

The book was well written. I enjoyed getting a good idea of the characters before we started dipping into the past and learning more about them. And it’s the past that is most interesting. If I tell you any more there’ll be spoilers.

I found it took me some time to orient myself as to which country and city it was set in. I’ll give you a hint, it’s London, England. I might have been confused by a previous book which was set in Australia. Parts of the book are set on a boat, in a river. I instantly thought of Sydney which has ferry services. I can’t remember what I read that oriented me, but it was quite some pages in. London is mentioned on page 67, can’t be certain if it’s the first mention.

Nice little murder mystery. I won’t say any more as I’m really struggling to write tonight. It seems to be physical as well as anything else, so many typos I’ve had to fix.

You might like to look at the book, maybe tell me why I should have realised it was set in London earlier than I did. If you want to do that here’s the link. Thanks to all those people who have clicked in the past week.


{"email":"Email address invalid","url":"Website address invalid","required":"Required field missing"}