‘White Out‘ had a strong enough plot to grab my interest and keep me eager to find out what really happened but I could have done with a little less melodrama and a little more effective police work.

‘White Out’ took a while to find its feet but had cranked up to being a tense thriller by the final third of the book.

It was the first book in the ‘Badlands’ trilogy and it was good enough for me to want to read the rest.

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The ‘cake’ of the plot of ‘White Out’ is well-baked: two people with memory loss who hide the gaps in case they’ve done something bad, a disgruntled detective who isn’t fitting into small-town life, a murder and a car wreck that might be connected, and the dark shadow of a dead serial killer.

It should have been irresistible but the ‘cake’ was smothered in an emotive ‘icing’ that was way too rich for me. The ‘No heartstring left untugged‘ approach distanced me from both the plot and the characters for a while.

The story is told from three points of view: the woman who regained consciousness but not her memory after a car crash and who worries that she’s done something bad, the ex-soldier turned bar owner who has no memory of the night before and who worries that he was has done something bad during a PTSD episode, and the detective who worries that she is being excluded by her colleagues, who trusts no one and is desperate to find someone to arrest as soon as possible. All three of them gush emotions on every page.

I could see that the plot depended on two of the characters having faulty memories, the fear that they’ve done something bad that they can’t remember and the possibility that their fears are justified but I found the ‘no-nuance-left-unnudged’ content of their interior monologuing to be irritatingly heavy-handed.

BUT

It was an entertaining story that kept me listening to the end. The plot dug into my curiosity early and didn’t let go. The sense of threat and paranoia rose page after page and as it did I became more invested in the fate of the main characters. The last third of the book had my complete attention and kept me guessing to the end.

‘White Out’ is the first book of a trilogy featuring Detective Kylie Milliard so I was surprised to find that she was the character who irritated me the most. It wasn’t that I didn’t find her convincing, it was more that I wondered how she kept her job.

Milliard was all passion and no process. Her interview style was an unpleasant and ineffective mix of bullying and disrespect, She didn’t collect data or build trust. She tried to force suspects to admit to things she is sure they’re guilty of, even though her ‘certainty’ is based on gut feel rather than data. She’d have been a good fit for the Met Flying Squad in 70’s England before PACE changed the rules.

Still, her lack of competence and over-abundance of zeal kept the plot moving nicely.

I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series and seeing if she gets any better at her job.

I recommend the audiobook version of ‘White Out‘. Whitney Dykhouse did a great job at the narration, with distinctive voices for each characters and great pacing. Click on the SoundCloud link below to hear a sample.