Number 53- The eleven- Kyle Rutkin

I received an ARC copy from Netgalley in exchange for a fair review

Kyle Rutkin is a completely new name to me.  The cover looked interesting and so did the plot and so I requested my review copy.

Conner Daniels is an intern for a celebrity gossip website. When famed actress Savannah Beck goes missing and an email to the website suggests a flimsy link to washed up screenwriter Kohl Reynolds, Conner is assigned the task of tracking him down. Kohl’s email promises the greatest story ever that could break Hollywood, but with his reputation as a washed up drunk, no one else had taken the email seriously.

Conner’s a clever chap and finds his man within the first chapter. Most of the rest of the book becomes Kohl’s telling of his life story with jumps back to the current day storyline, with the police closing in on Reynolds.

It’s all very fast paced and hard-boiled, with a conspiracy theory involving cults, satanic influences, and Dante’s Divine Comedy. All the threads of the conspiracy are linked by the mysterious symbol of the Eleven.

I found it all started to fall apart somewhat as it got closer to the end of the book. The end of Kohl’s story does not match up with his behaviour or actions at the start of the book (which they should do, since that’s the point at which the twin narratives collide). For example, we’re not told at which point he sent the email or why. If things are as charged as they are at that point in Kohl’s story, why did he go to see his agent, or indeed to the bar where Conner first meets him.  At this point he is apparently already a fugitive from the law, despite that not happening until the midpoint of the current storyline (Conner’s narration). Also, the behaviour of Grace, Conner’s love interest, does not quite add up at this point either.

The Satanic cult behind everything is suitably menacing.  I like the fact that, despite using character names from the Divine Comedy, Rutkin doesn’t hammer us over the head with the links, instead leaving the canny reader to put 2 and 2 together.

There is plenty of commentary about the damage a bad childhood does to an adult, but incorporated into the story so it doesn't ever feel like it's preaching.

It’s well written and builds tension nicely throughout. It might be vaguely predictable, but it’s a nice take on an overused theme. The two narrators have their own distinct voices, which is always good. There’s nothing more irritating than multiple narrators who talk in the same voice.  It’s a shame he drops the ball at the end, but this was easily good enough that I will read another of his books.