AFTER THE FIRE

Jamie Worth, a newly qualified firearms officer is called to a disturbance at a house where a teenage girl is alleged to have a gun.  In the chaos, he shoots and kills the girl, but there is no trace of a gun anywhere in the vicinity.  Traumatised already, the nightmare has only just started, as finds himself accused of murder.   Imprisoned, Jamie needs all his wits and strength as he is far from safe inside.  Do Cath and ex-lover Anna have enough will and courage to seek justice for Jamie? 

The most powerful crime dramas always arise from emotive stories in the media; the bravest are born out of telling the opposite story to the one commonly told.  Karen expertly weaves her prose so well, that you feel yourself living, breathing and even sympathising with the characters; from the heartache of the fatherless children and their mother, to Jamie’s plight of being on the wrong side of the prison doors and indeed in fear for his life.  So powerful, you can hear all the characters speak in their Glaswegian dialects and feel all their highs and lows.  Karen is not afraid to write about a few potential weaknesses in the police force she used to be employed by; proving they are as human as the rest of us. 

The novel is thought-provoking and engaging, ideal book club fodder which could fuel much debate about miscarriages of justice and the sympathy that is not often levelled at the relatives of accused and convicted criminals.  However, albeit I am a quick reader, this book is very long and constantly squeezes, painfully, at your emotions, until at times you feel like shouting at it – enough already!  Yet, still you turn the pages, knowing that surely it has to get better.