MIDNIGHT WATER CITY by Chris McKinney (B-) reviewed by Rhonda Allen
Usually I enjoy science fiction novels that take a new approach and I almost liked this one. It takes place in 2042, and the earth has barely escaped a world ending collision with an asteroid. That it escaped was due to a scientist - Akira Kimura who first discovered the asteroid and its trajectory and also developed the instrument/machine that destroyed it. Following the destruction, Akira became an almost worshiped celebrity. Now years later she has called upon her former head of security (the narrator of the book) for help. When he arrives at her supposedly impregnable deep sea home, he finds her dead and her body dismembered with laser like precision. The book then becomes a neo-noir mystery with the narrator examining his past with Akira and trying to solve her impossible murder. While this sounds like a book right up my alley (I like mystery thrillers too) I found it hard to keep at it. There are multiple time jumps and though the mystery is solved, getting there is difficult and sort of anti-climatic. The narrator is hard to sympathize with or even like and in some ways did some despicable things at Akira's bequest. Over all it took me a couple of weeks to get through because I almost gave up on it several times.