Acid Row is a novel by crime-writer Minette Walters. The novel examines contemporary reactions to paedophilia and resulting urban rioting, and was.
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When residents of a sink estate get word that a newcomer is in fact a convicted paedophile, coupled with the fact that a local 10 year old girl is missing, tempers soon start to flare. The actual storyline is pretty good, it really kept me interested and gripped me. I did have a few reservations about it. I thought the depiction of Melanie, the smoking and drinking pregnant single mum of two with a heart of gold came just a little bit too close to being patronising to be true.
I would have liked to have seen her character toned down just a little bit. I certainly enjoyed the storyline anyway. Sep 26, Paul Bryant rated it did not like it Recommends it for: Ow, avert your eyes. Such very bad dialogue! Here we have a novel which tries really hard to turn today's headline into a fast-paced insightful, gritty yet ultimately inspiring novel but drastically fails on every page.
Minette Walters does not appear to have first hand experience of how the unrespectable working class actually talk, whether black or white, so she makes it up It sounds more like an Ealing comedy, if they were still makeing them in th Ow, avert your eyes. It sounds more like an Ealing comedy, if they were still makeing them in the s. And there's page after page of it That must man the author, her partner, her agent and her publisher all thought this stuff was okay.
She's surrounded by idiots! Leave them all now! Where do you begin with Acid Row? Every scene we've seen before - the angry crowds, the hostage taken, the subtle police interrogation, the crisis which brings out the best and the worst in people I'm swearing, I'm party to crimes, and I haven't felt so useful in years! You never came across anyone like him. It's that not so very reluctant hero Jimmy Jones, the giant black guy, very large, friendly in a deadpan sort of way, and willing to have a go at anything - running back into burning houses to rescue known sex offenders, carrying unconscious people across his shoulders, and all the time being sensitive to old folks and little kids.
The "Two months later" chapter at the end puts the tin hat on the whole thing, where Jimmy and the feisty old lady have a good chuckle about their crazy wild adventure, just the way they used to in the last scene of any American TV show of the 60s and 70s. A few wry comments, a few lessons learned. Here's the lesson I learned: View all 9 comments.
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Dec 07, Mark rated it really liked it Shelves: Another pot boiler from my new favorite author. Ms Walters is able to manage multiple concurrent streams of narrative and keep the reader vitaly involved in each thread. In this one, a word spoken in anger at a most inappropriate time leads to an expolsion of violence directed at a pedophile that was recently moved into a poor neighborhood. Unfortunately for all, the pedophile in question had nothing to do with the incident that incited the mob. But the mob psychology takes over, the neigborhood Another pot boiler from my new favorite author.
But the mob psychology takes over, the neigborhood becomes an armed fortress, the police are kept at bay, and tragedy ensues. Meanwhile the DCI assigned to the case of the missing child is desparately trying to track her down before any harm comes to her.
Suspicion focuses on the girl's father and on his business associate who has demonstrated a certain liking for women who look like young girls, many of whom resemble the missing girl. Throw in a policewoman injured in a routine police call and who is trapped inside the aforementioned fortress, and a visiting health practicioner being held hostage by the pedophile and his equally perverted father, and this becomes a real nail-biter.
This reader finds it easy to insert himself into the story as an interested observer. A most enjoyable read. This is really a 3. I enjoyed this book as a good suspenseful ride but I can't put it on the same level as a four star crime novel. Although I enjoyed it I was not really transported into the character's lives. Walters knows how to handle the pacing in her plot, she keeps things moving always at the right speed. Not breakneck speed, she knows when to apply the breaks but there was very rarely a slow moment or a time when the storyline did not progress.
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The characters were well written, but they s This is really a 3. The characters were well written, but they still felt a bit flat or impersonal I guess. It felt like seven eighths of a novel and one eighth police report. It is told from the viewpoint of hind sight - and she keeps giving cryptic warnings during the narrative about what will happen next. If only so and so hadn't done this or little did she know what would happen to so and so when she walked into the room.
In a way that was an interesting take on it, in another way I think it helped flatten out the characters and storyline a bit. What really interested me about this book is that it is actually set near where I live. Portisfield, where this story takes place is actually Portsmouth and the paedophile riots actually did happen and I remember reading about it all in the news. I don't believe it was half as violent or as atrocious as the scenario represented in this book - she took some dramatic license there! However, a couple of 'police reports' at the beginning were actually based on true life cases the girl tied up in the bath which unless you're from the UK and read it in the news every day you may not be so aware of.
I will definitely be reading some more Walters in the future, she is a good author and if I want some guaranteed enjoyment I'll know where to turn. But nothing that really lit any fires under my bones. Jan 30, Bev Taylor rated it really liked it. Jan 06, Julie rated it really liked it Shelves: Walters is at her best in exploring the banality of criminal activity and intent -- and in this book, once again, she shines. In pursuing the leads to find a missing year-old girl, the reader is led into a maze of inter-connections which is at once astounding, predictable, and tragic. I don't know how Walters manages to weave all three into one mundane little crime, but she reveals herein she has a masterful grasp of the depraved indifference that men and women often demonstrate towards each Walters is at her best in exploring the banality of criminal activity and intent -- and in this book, once again, she shines.
I don't know how Walters manages to weave all three into one mundane little crime, but she reveals herein she has a masterful grasp of the depraved indifference that men and women often demonstrate towards each other. Clever little book -- which sneaks out from the reeds and pounces on you unawares.
At first glance, her novel may seem quite pedestrian, but think about it a little, and you'll see she's absolutely brilliant! Dec 12, Asghar Abbas rated it liked it. You can read it today, especially in America, and it still be relevant. I love Minette Walters but this one doesn't work, for me. The concept is an unstable foundation to begin with and it goes to hell in a hand basket from there. Very readably but - the characters don't work, the storyline doesn't convince.
The abduction is bizarre why have 2 of them in the flat - are we supposed to have to decide which is worse, the paedophile or the fascist woman hater? Topped off with the unbelievable child abduction story running parallel. The police are not credible. Somethi I love Minette Walters but this one doesn't work, for me. Something went horribly wrong for MW with this book. As I said, it's very readable, oddly. Nothing wrong with MWs pacing! I think that shaky, unclear premise that tried to tie too many things into the story is the basis of the problem and opening the story with the wooden, stereotyped 'old maid' Health Visitor.
Sophie didn't invite my sympathy, either; she had about as much sense as a thing with no sense at all! Ah well - even a favourite writer can produce a book that is less than perfect! Read by Claire Higgins blurb - Minette Walters has shaped a fascinating tale of poverty, of desperation, and of the lengths people feel forced to go, when living in neglected, government housing, under conditions of inhuman proportions.
Without missing a beat Minet Read by Claire Higgins blurb - Minette Walters has shaped a fascinating tale of poverty, of desperation, and of the lengths people feel forced to go, when living in neglected, government housing, under conditions of inhuman proportions. Without missing a beat Minette Walters has portrayed these people and the events that push them over the edge, with every syllable arranged in a well-paced rhythm. This is Walters's eighth novel, and she has reached even loftier heights than ever before. Nothing here for me; let's find something more endearing shouldn't be hard.
View all 6 comments. This is a great book with loads of suspens. The characters are interesting and all have a floars. The main characters are deep and they all seem real. Habe es nach ca. Die Charaktere waren schwach, Dialoge kaum vorhanden und die Story eher mau. Sep 21, Heather rated it did not like it. After having adored other books by this writer, I was saving Acid Row for a treat. Imagine the inner turmoil! Imagine the doctor trying to survive AND figure out if the pedophile really has that little girl locked away somewhere, AND having to rely on him at the same time and seing him as a human being!
What a potential for inner conflict. Well, none of that happens in this book. Instead we get a big steaming pile of clichees. The pedophile is a big wuss who can't tie his own shoelaces, because 3. And of course he also sexually abused his son, so his son Wussy Pedobear grew up to be a man who can't tie his own shoelaces or make his own decisions It's totally obvious from the start that no-one in this storyline has anything to do with the vanishing of the little girl.
Sorry, no burning questions there. The only interesting question is "is Doctor Lolita going to get raped or not? Oh, and Evil Dad also murdered his own wife, which Doctor Lolita figures out via The rest of the book is populated by White Trash stock characters. To be honest, they were so boring that I simply skipped those parts. In the end, it turns out that the little girl has really "vanished" herself because she's an unthinking brat.
Acid Row by Minette Walters
That was a nice touch, so Walters gets a star for that. Everything else is clicheed and over-the-top. What a waste of a really good set-up! Unfortunately, Walters often ends up wasting good ideas in favour of sensationalism. This finely crafted thriller tells the story of a sink estate which descends into lethal violence after an employee of the social services, breaking the rules in a well-meaning but appallingly-judged attempt to persuade a feckless mother to pay more attention to the whereabouts of her child, lets slip that there is a registered sex offender living on the estate.
Unfortunately at about the same time a child does go missing actually she's wandered off but people jump to the false conclusion that the paedophile has taken her and the situation rapidly becomes explosive. Two well-meaning local mothers organise what they intend to be a peaceful mass protest, but it gets hijacked by a group of drunken adolescent young men, and the demonstration turns into a dangerous howling mob, with about as much discrimination as was shown in the real-world incident when a mob wrecked a doctor's car because they didn't understand the difference between a paediatrician and a paedophile.
The ringleader of the mob is narrowly prevented from setting fire to a block of homes which includes the property where the sex offender lives, because there are children in some of the other properties which would be burned down in any such fire, but the crowd nonetheless gets out of control creating a serious risk to a great number of innocent lives. An unlikely hero sets out to rescue his girlfriend, and ends up saving a large number of people, but ultimately the violence of the mob has fatal results The book contains a number of finely crafted characters, including the doctor who is called to treat a member of the family the mob suspect of being paedophiles and gets taken hostage, the unlikely hero, and the helpless authorities.
A harrowing but very powerful thriller. Minette Walters has long been one of my favorite authors and I have never graded her lower than four stars. This is a strange novel in several senses: Once again, we are given a cast of interesting, realistic people caught in situations both gritty and pitiful.
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The best thing about Walters's characters is their dialogue - they talk like people in real life and not in books. There are two plotlines. The first concerns the disappearance of a young girl in a bad part of town - Acid Row.
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Investigations leades to ominous revelations. The second concerns Melanie, a welfare mom trying to overcome a host of issues. Her dialogue wanders and stews and then jabs like a bayonet. Her plots often evolve out of sequence. She simply won't walk the line—and she's confoundingly good at taking liberties. Here, Walters transports readers to Acid Row, a dungeon of a housing project in a London suburb populated by single mothers, fatherless children, criminals fresh from prison, gangs and the helpless elderly.
It's a community, however, bonded in its destitution, suspicious and unwelcoming of outsiders. When word leaks out that the government has placed a pedophile in No.