Take a walk on the wild side (Catch Me When I Fall - Nicci French)

Member Name: kirstymack80

Product:	Catch Me When I Fall - Nicci French
Date:	10/10/06 (164 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: unsettling, gripping

Disadvantages: main character off her head so the reader has little sympathy for her!

Holly Krauss lives life on the edge. She's an adrenalin junkie who gets by on nervous energy and lots and lots of coffee and very little sleep. So when she goes out to a bar after work one day with her colleagues, they aren't really surprised to see her stepping into an argument between a drunk businessman and the female bartender. Initially the bully man tells her where to go, but having charmed him with her audacity, she is soon drinking with him and his friends. Her colleagues, having seen it all before, leave her alone to fend for herself.

Events after that are shady - Holly remembers going to a nightclub with the man, of drinking more and more and then drugs becoming involved. Memories fade but somewhere she remembers a shop window breaking and then a bed, and a man and another woman on it, and fingers fumbling with buttons, and blood in her mouth. '"This is so strange' she said. I said. "Don't stop"'.

The next morning, realising what she has done, she creeps home from an unknown flat. She finds her way back to her house and gets into her own bed - the bed she shares with her husband, Charlie.

But, as in all Nicci French's books - this isn't the end to her sordid, secret night. She's left her mobile phone behind and soon, 'Rees', the man involved, is ringing her, threatening her and even turning up at her office with her knickers (well, obviously!). Sometimes, a one night stand can be the death of you …

* What I thought *

Wow! What a great start to a book. I loved this right from the beginning. Holly, for me, wasn't a particularly likeable gal which gave her a certain edginess that made her stand out from other characters in these type of books. She is a successful businesswoman and isn't afraid to step on other people's toes to get what she wants, even sacking one of her colleagues just because she could. But she does seem to love her husband, which makes her behaviour seem all the more odd.

We get to see the nasty side of her sporadically as she experiences road rage and ends up punching a man who'd tried to out-race her. She then steals a lady's leather gloves and shawl from the restroom in a nightclub, seemingly just for the hell of it. She enjoys confrontation , indeed she seems to thrive on it. This is someone who doesn't think of the consequences that lie ahead and leaves a trail of furious people behind her.

Immediately the reader is drawn into Holly's bizarre world - the rock hard bitch on the outside but slowly unravelling inside. Crying in the bath, mixing her words up, buying expensive works of art on a whim that she can't afford. What was going on inside her head?

As always there is a heavy sense of unease throughout the book. Rees doesn't appear too often but one does sense his presence throughout. Although he's only spent one night with Holly, he knows all her friends courtesy of her mobile phone, and even where she lives and works. There is no escape from him. Holly is finding it more and more difficult to explain the bizarre happenings to her friends and family - her only close confidante being Meg, her trusty business partner. She begs Holly to go to the police but Holly has to do things her own way …

I must admit I found this particular story quite unnerving. Something similar happened to one of my friends - her handbag was stolen while she was asleep on the train home. The man then started to ring her and even turned up at her house in the middle of the night. This went on for months. So this story was quite 'close to home' for me and I think this probably affected me more than some of the other books by Nicci French have. This 'stalking' is frighteningly realistic.

One can't help but think that Holly brings half the problems on herself. She goes off with strangers without a second thought, getting herself into all types of dangerous situations. It's only a matter of time before the 'big boys' get involved. Her recklessness will be her downfall one feels throughout, but at the same time she shows vulnerability and expects her husband Charlie and Meg to sympathise when things go wrong. She pushes everyone and everything to the limit and there's only one way to go for her - and that's down.

* Verdict *

I really enjoyed this book. Although I had planned on taking it on holiday as soon as it arrived by post I read a few pages and from thereonin was hooked. I finished it within a couple of days. It's not a long read and is very easy to pick up and put down with frequent breaks in the chapters. This is cleverly done sometimes as it helps us understand Holly's disjointed nights when her husband is away and she goes out to play.

The reader is mostly taken through Holly's suffering, which isn't always easy to read and a lot of us will have little sympathy for a wild and reckless character who leaves her lacy knickers at complete stranger's houses and antagonises so many around her. There's a lesson to be learned here so you have been warned!

The full five stars and a recommendation from La Mack.

My copy was £2.99 in hardback version from Bol.com (who now call themselves Bookgiant) but it recently came out in paperback so it's worth shopping around on Ebay and Amazon.

* Other info *

ISBN 0141006528
Year 2006
RRP £6.99 (£4.99 delivered on play.com)
400 pages (paperback)
Published by Penguin Books Ltd (UK)

* About the author*

Nicci French is husband and wife duo Nicci Gerrard and Sean French. They have written a number of books together such as The Memory Game, The Safe House, Killing Me Softly, Beneath the Skin, The Red Room, Land of the Living and Secret Smile.

For more info: www.niccifrench.co.uk

Thanks for reading!

Summary: A one night stand ends in disaster