The Empty Kayak by Jodé Millman

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I received a copy of Millman's new novel as a Goodreads Giveaway. I enjoyed the complex plot featuring the drowning death of Kyle in the Hudson River; the circumstances surrounding his drowning were ambiguous - was it suicide, was it accidental or was it murder? As so often the initial police and family reactions favored misadventure; others favored suicide and a few went for the killing option. Millman expertly walks the reader thru the investigation's painstaking work to discover the truth with Kyle's former fiancé Jessie adding her own dogged efforts to find the reasons for his untimely passing.

The initial opening of the novel sets the stage so strongly that it motivates the reader to want to know what's going to happen. Kyle's new fiancé, Olivia, seems suspiciously distracted by her phone and her appearance at the scene by the river; we learn about a missing plug in his kayak - is this a red herring? Why did Kyle change his insurance beneficiaries just before his death? What were Kyle and Olivia's brother Augie arguing about? Millman wraps up this thriller into a exciting package of forensic evidence, passionate finger-pointing and outright lies.

At times the novel suffered from overuse of adjectives and descriptive phrases that didn't really drive the plot forward but this observation didn't detract from my enjoyment of the book.

Shawn Callon, author of The Simon Montfort Series, wrote this review.



View all my reviews
The Empty Kayak