Robinson does a fabulous job of combining some of the realistic
details of violent crime, and police work, along with making
the story an entertaining read.
There is a fine line between the technical details of crime and
police work, on the one hand, and the entertaining, readable
story-telling on the other, but this author knows exactly how
to handle this line, and "Aftermath" is a masterpiece of combining the 2 facets of crime-writing.
This book contains a few necessary "dirty" details, but no more
than is required for this story. Anyone who complains about too
much detail of blood, vicious and depraved motives, and twisted
personalities have no concept of what is present in genuine
crime and the shocks real police officers encounter.
The author touches on, and explores a bit, the very complex
questions of the level of responsibility of a woman involved in
a bloody crime along with her male partner. The fact that he
doesn't present some veneer-thin explanation, that might be
easy to understand, shows his understanding of the difficulty
of explaining and categorizing some of these relationships.
Robinson has said this novel wasn't based on the infamous Bernardo-Homolka case in Ontario, but there are some very
parallel facts present, and we should give credit for some
inspiration from a very real, and more horrific, case than his
work here could convey.
Here is a work that is thought-provoking, realistic and quite
entertaining. Most highly recommended.
