I also have to admit to some book series ignorance. Near the end of this book (for the second time, see below), I decided that I liked the characters so much I wanted to know more about them. After a little research I found that this is the third out of four books so far by Atkinson using Jackson Brodie as a character. I realize it has been a long time since I last read "Case Histories," which I have read twice, but I why didn't I recognize this character? I remember saying once that it is the feeling of "Case Histories" that I recall rather than the details. I should be happy that there are other Jackson Brodie books waiting for me to read, but jealous that so many other people knew that before I did.
"Good News" has been a strange read. Or rather listen. At first, I thought it was a hard to pick up on what was happening, but still quite interesting. When I got to the halfway point (the audio was downloaded in two files) I was curious to find out what happened next. But when I started listening to what I thought was the second half, I was surprised that the story took us to a point long before the action I had already listened to. It was then that I realized that I had listened to the second half of the book first.
Strange, because I didn't feel like I had started in the middle of a book, and more strange is that the end did not feel like the end. But, then I listened to the beginning and it was like reading a prequel.
I grew to like Reggie Chase ("I'm sixteen"), Louise Monroe ("Detective Chief Inspector Monroe") and Jackson Brodie ("I used to be a policeman") more and more as the story unfolded (and folded back on itself). I wanted to like Joanna Hunter as well, and even thought about her and Jackson getting together, but Atkinson keeps her at arm's distance from the reader for a reason.
Jackson cannot resist a plea for help. He was once a policeman and then a private investigator. By mistake, he ends up in Edinburgh where he falls under the irresistible force that is Reggie Chase. By chance, Jackson's ex-colleague, maybe ex-something else, Louise Monroe is a detective who is keeping watch over two women who were terrorized in the past by different men, and there is always a chance that the men will return. One of those women is Joanna Hunter, mother, wife and doctor. Her husband is into some shady business and under the scrutiny of Detective Chief Inspector Monroe's department. Dr. Hunter's nanny is Reggie Chase, a 16-year-old high school dropout who loves the classics and would like to have the opportunity to go to college, but first she has to find a place to live. And if all that wasn't enough, Jackson Brodie was the policeman that found Joanna Chase when she was lost as a child decades earlier.
Whew! I find these coincidences amusing, and Atkinson uses humor in other ways. I found the story engaging but more terrifying, and thus more memorable, than “Case Histories.” I wonder about Atkinson's psyche because almost all of her characters have suffered the person loss of someone in their life to illness, suicide, accident, murder or other crime. Kidnapping is a common theme. Are the other books like that?
As for Brodie, I fell in love and wanted to have to ask him for help someone. I know he would oblige.
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