When her best friend is accused of murdering an underworld figure and kidnapped pending execution, a stripper turned private detective goes undercover in the seedier side of the sex industry to find the real killer and save her friend. Along the way she is set up by the city’s most corrupt police officer, gets mixed up with a team of bizarre strippers and finds herself falling in lust with inappropriate men.
This book is set in Melbourne, Australia and we are choked with the fact. While a few local references are great to give a feeling for the city where the story takes place this one gives so many that at times it felt almost like a geography lesson. Sometimes less is more, this should have been one of those times. On the plus side the details given were correct as far as I know.
There was also just a touch too much of the strippers are just like all other women. They have boyfriends, children, advanced education etc. The shocking flop that was the movie Striptease comes to mind. I know that there are stereotypes out there that paint sex workers as uneducated, drug addicted, immoral and so on but I don’t think people who hold those kind of ideas of the sex industry would be attracted to this book. So all the passages that are there to show those assumptions aren’t true come across as preaching to the choir. We know.
Having said that I did find Peepshow to be a light, breezy and entertaining read with a twist I didn’t see coming until it was upon me. As a debut novel it was a good effort and I smell a series coming on.
Redhead is not at the level of ‘I’ll be watching out for her new releases’ just yet but I would expect her to improve with further experience, so who knows maybe one day.-Lynn
To read Alex's review of this book, click here
No comments:
Post a Comment