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THE STAR  BOOK  REVIEW  

October 7, 2024 October 2024, Regular Features No Comments

By Brenda Channer – 

Martinborough Bookshop

“All the Colours of the Dark” by Chris Whittaker.

First and foremost this is a story about people: Patch, Saint, Grace, Misty, Charlotte, Chief Nix, Sammy, Tooms, Eli _ and then it is about the horrifying crime that shaped and shadowed their lives. This is the aspect of Chris Whittaker’s writing I like the most. 

His books are driven almost equally by plot and character development, and this makes reading the book a rich experience. So, you will find this book in the Crime and Thrillers section of the bookshop but don’t expect a Jack Reacher style formula. It offers much more than that.

In small town America a community is horrified when a 13-year-old boy nicknamed Patch is abducted by an unknown assailant. Patch remains alive during his captivity in pitch darkness largely due to Grace, who is there in the dark with him, talking to him and holding him. 

When Patch is found some unspecified time later thanks to the dogged determination of his best and only friend Saint, he is changed forever. The trajectory of everyone else’s lives is also changed, and it is this story that holds the reader captive as it unfolds. 

Covering a 20+ year time span the characters have time to grow up and weave in and out of each other’s lives. There is time for the layered, complex nature of real lives lived to develop and for the nature of long held and nurtured obsession to be explored from many angles.

To be more specific would give too much away. But I hope your interest may have been sparked, especially if you are an avid thriller reader like me but you also love a story well told where you can become immersed in the lives of your characters – only to put the book down and discover another hour has passed and the washing still needs bringing in! 

Available at your local bookshop.

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