Cultural Dessert

‘When Will There Be Good News’, Kate Atkinson’s third Jackson Brodie novel maintains the structure of its predecessor ‘One Good Turn’ (reviewed here in February 2008). The story is told in the third person but the point of view rotates, chapter by chapter, in this case around three main characters. Atkinson has some fun in occasionally keeping you guessing as to whose eyes you are seeing a scene through – particularly when several of the ‘narrators’ are present. Once again former policeman and private detective Jackson Brodie is thrown into a crime story that refuses to follow the conventions of crime writing. After a stunning opening chapter, a host of misunderstandings and coincidences gradually contrive to resolve the principal mysteries but leave several loose ends. Extremely readable and very enjoyable.