Conviction by Denise Mina
I would like to thank Hope from Vintage Books for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review
Publisher – Vintage Books
Published – 20th February
Price – £8.99 Paperback £6.00 Kindle e-book
Its just a normal morning when Anna’s husband announces that he’s leaving her for her best friend and taking their two daughters with him.
With her safe comfortable world shattered, Anna distracts herself with someone else’s story: a true-crime podcast. That is until she recognises the name of one of the victims and becomes convinced that only she knows what really happened.
With nothing left to lose, she throws herself into investigating the case. But little does she know, Anna’s past and present lives are about to collide, sending everything she has worked so hard to achieve into freefall.
Podcasts are amazingly addictive. I recall them getting through an unexpected stay in hospital when I couldn’t sleep, and I definitely was one of the many drawn to Serial turning amateur detective for the story of a crime that just has an awful lot of unanswered questions. Podcasts are very personal, they can go with you everywhere and take us away from our own lives. But imagine you knew one of the people a true crime drama like Serial was discussing and then you just know the crime being discussed couldn’t have happened the way the producers thought it did. That is the fascinating hook behind the excellent thriller Conviction by Denise Mina.
In an affluent part of Glasgow Anna is a model wife to a wealthy lawyer with two adorable kids and a perfect home. She hates flying and her biggest vice is that she will read and listen to any story – even when her husband is talking to her. True crime podcasts are a great new passion. So her early morning ritual starts like any other and she listens to the latest podcast craze about a horrific family murder on a yacht that has its own checkered history and then is stunned to find out that one of the victims was a friend she made back in another life – Leon Parker and she is convinced the more she hears that there is no way Leon could have killed anyone.
But just as the story gets interesting her husband announces he is leaving her; taking her children and his new girlfriend is her best friend. Anna is emotionally devastated and just to survive the next few hours alone listens to more tales of the Dana murders and realises another ghost from her past is probably responsible. In a rushed act of a need to just do something she sets out to find out more and in her trail are her former best friend’s partner and some parties who will both be a lot less happy to know the case is being investigated again and that Anna is actually alive.
Conviction is a stunning thriller and like any good crime podcast its hard to let go of once you start. It’s full of mysteries to unravel; strange connections and a tale that just like the finest episode cliffhangers makes you eagerly turn the page to the next chapter. The mystery of the Dana is in itself tantalising – a millionaire family that mysteriously vanished one night along with their ship in a French harbour; a ship that is then found sunken with all the family members brutally murdered and a ghostly figure captured on a dying diver’s footage. Throw in the Dana’s apparently cursed owners and you get the kind of mystery that any real podcast would bite your hand off for. Mina has clearly studied how podcasts are now made and narrated as the chatty tone of the narrator; use of other footage and even the little adverts from sponsors perfectly capture the tone and feel of a podcast where the simple story mushrooms in unexpected directions with some truly skilled reveals. It’s a mystery that really pulls the reader in.
Intriguingly though through Anna who is also the stories main narrator we have a second mystery on top. We soon learn that Anna is not her real name; that she married her husband partly to hide and her past involves not just Leon but also his wife and now widow the incredibly wealthy Gretchen Teigler. Anna knew Gretchen Teigler in her past and that’s a mystery she is far less willing to have exposed. Anna is a fascinating lead – on the one hand, funny and driven but also clearly suffering from her past experiences and it’s a harder mystery to solve. Her life story we slowly see doesn’t add up and only gets revealed in slow reveals. I loved this element of the tale because it felt very relevant to today’s works and attitudes especially as Anna sees ger life shown everywhere on social media t be picked apart. The other key character that literally had only knocked her door is the mysterious aloof former rock star Fin who was her best friend’s husband. Another lost soul he is strangely happy to play sidekick to Anna as they start to piece together the mystery and he realises Anna also has a secret.
I really liked the ay this story moves from a simple domestic break up to a cross-country trip around Europe as Anna and Fin start to uncover the truth, they also find that their lives are in jeopardy. We start to mistrust everyone they meet and look for more revelations which makes the eventual unpicking of this mystery in a very tense finale so satisfying.
Conviction is a very polished and well plotted thriller with two wonderfully crafted mysteries that any reader will want to try and unravel. It’s tense, surprising and also has a great emotional core as we get to care about Anna, Fin and the people harmed in this tale. It feels very much a novel for right here and now too with the many themes it explores. If you love podcasts and crime then this is a perfect mix for you.
