One Step to Danger

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One Step to Danger

Category:	Fiction
Author:	John Gubert
Publisher:	Matador
Price:	£7.99
ISBN:	978-1906221-355
Pages:	288
Reviewed in issue:	9

This book’s cover is certainly glossy and professional. It promises a lot – but does it deliver? Some ‘blurb’ on the author would have been welcome. I also feel that a trick has been missed: in that with the author’s exotic locations, his chapter headings (eg: A Night In Cannes, The Road To Rio, Hong Kong Strikes), a chapter list would have acted as a good ‘hook’.

This thriller certainly does what it says on the tin. It's action on almost every single page. But can you have too much action? For me, the answer is yes. The action is constant. There is no let-up. No light and shade. No pause for the reader to catch his/her breath. For me, the two main characters, Charles and Jacqui, are predictably written. SHE is a Miss World look-a-like with brains and a heart while HE is James Bond-esque. Their emotional flaws are in evidence, but what about some physical flaws? They both tear across the globe in their designer outfits trying to execute their brilliant master plan and thereby live happily ever after as multi-millionaires. Tried and tested as a plot, I’m afraid.

John Gubert’s writing style is descriptive. He describes at length great chunks of action. Passages of dialogue are few and far between. I think all this action is more ‘visual’ and in that sense, could be placed on the small screen, for example. At £7.99 the book is reasonably priced. Is there room for another thriller? Probably.

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