Heads up: this is a review of an Uncorrected proof.

In Norway, a mother loses her daughter under suspicious circumstances, and the specialist squad handling underaged kids are called to handle it. Elsewhere, and in another time, a college nursing student develops an unhealthy, dark obsession with a snake. As the timelines intertwine the story of trauma and pain is explored through the unraveling of multiple threads.

This is a multiple point-of-view, duel timeline (and change) mystery, suspense thriller. I am not sure the blurb does the reader much service with comparisons to Gillian Flynn and Tana French. Jo Nesbø is more akin to it, since it’s upmarket prose wise. Tonally, it is pretty dark; I’m sure that’s where Flynn comes from. But the French, I guess because some of the perspectives are from cops on a squad? But it also suggests a bit more complexity to the characters, plot, and especially the prose. It’s a mixed bag.

It’s pretty much exactly what the plot says it is though. It follows through. The prose get out of the way when at their best. The plot, as many of these multiple POV, multiple timelines stories tend to go, is really quite slow and artificially pumped up with short chapters, thriller style. It’s above standard commercial fiction. This explores trauma in an interesting but contrived manner. You really need to suspend your disbelief. I’m sure some of this has cases in real life, but there isn’t craftwork present to make some of aspects believable. As it goes on, this gets exacerbated. I think your mileage may vary on that front. A couple specific conceits you either can roll with, or not.

If you do manage to accept the premise and the conceits as they appear, there’s a satisfying through-line traced here.