The Abbey by Chris Culver
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
As the hover text over two stars says: it was okay. It actually had a really interesting idea going in, the idea of a Muslim detective in a city no one usually associates with fictional settings. The setting was okay. But it could’ve been any city as there weren’t that many references to Indianapolis’s character. And I’m not sure why the author made the detective a Muslim because he was basically your cliché American vigilante good guy who drinks. Like I haven’t seen that one before. The only twist was that he prays. Big whoop. The author could’ve done so much more with this character. He could’ve explored the idea of justice as seen from Ash’s cultural background. He could’ve invested emotion and passion (weirdly, the content was passionate but the language left me unmoved as if Ash was reciting a grocery list of bombs or something). The whole thing felt rather contrived. The ending was fine, like a standard 1970s’ cop drama ending.
I won this book as one of ten in a Twitter contest The Crime Vault held early in 2013.
