THE BURGLAR

By Thomas Perry

What was the point of this book?

The Ugly Truth:

Call me evil or upsetting, but this book just did not do it for me. While the concept of having a mid-20s female burglar who gets caught up in a high-profile LA crime was unique, the plot ultimately fell through. The book focused more on telling me about the main character’s talents rather than showing me an interesting novel. Instead of the usual movie playing in my head because of how caught up in the writing I get, I, unfortunately, was aware of the book in my hands the entire time. 

Now, this is not to offend author Thomas Perry, who usually does a fantastic job of capturing suspense and is able to perfectly thrill a reader. I think in the case ofThe Burglar, however, he got a little too attached to showing off his knowledge of robbing a house. In fact, at times it felt like I was reading a manual on how to successfully rob someone, and I ended the book honestly thinking I had a pretty solid idea on how to get away with it. Due to his lessons, Perry missed out on developing the leading lady, Elle Stowell, beyond just depicting her as a badass.

Elle Stowell had no emotions, even when a cruel tragedy struck her down, and she had this annoying attitude of “I know better than you,” which made it hard to support her decisions and aspirations. It was frustrating to see her try to solve the mystery because I felt like she could have gone about literally everything better. Additionally, while fun friends and unique family members were mentioned, they seemed to be a passing thought to both Perry and Elle, making her an unrelatable, isolated lead. I felt truly zero connection to this individual and was more curious about the “villain” than anything else.

On that note, the “big bad guys” that were responsible for the whole crime were built up for 300 pages, only to be a huge letdown by the time we finally realized their ploy. I felt as though there should have been a much more elaborate scheme and system at play than there was and, reader beware, to not even witness “true justice” bothered me.

ALSO, the ending, lol, just told me that Perry was not super connected with the inner workings of a girl because… What?? Was?? That??