The Memory Chamber - Holly Cave

Description

True death is a thing of the past...

Now you can spend the rest of eternity re-living your happiest memories: that first kiss, falling in love, the birth of your children, enjoyed on loop for ever and ever.

Isobel is a Heaven Architect, and she helps dying people create afterlives from these memories. So when she falls for Jarek, one of her terminal - and married - clients, she knows that while she cannot save him, she can create the most beautiful of heavens, just for him.

But when Jarek's wife is found dead, Isobel uncovers a darker side of the world she works within, and she can trust no one with what she finds...

Review

I do like books with an element of the future world. In this instance the book covers Isobel who is a heaven architect - she creates heavens for dying people so they can relive their best times over and over again after they are dead.

I wasn't sure quite how this concept would be possible, but I was willing to go with it. Unfortunately I was not prepared for Isobel being such a one dimensional character. To begin with I even wondered if she was actually a robot or AI life form - then she ate a banana. Of course in the future maybe AI will be eating food stuffs! She really was a little bit of a prima donna and I had trouble liking the character. 

Then she met Jarek and I felt she got worse - all the principles she seemed to need other people to live up to suddenly went out of the window in her own life,  and I was fearing that so would the book as I was finding it all a little boring.

Fortunately for me the book took a sudden turn of suspense when Jarek's wife was found dead. We were also thrust into some heavy futuristic happenings, as Isobel undertook something that had never been attempted before. The writing was very convincing even though I had no idea if this would ever actually be possible to attempt. I think this is down to the author having a science background which began to show at this point more.  Finally I began to have a little sympathy for Isobel and bond with her character somewhat.

I was then on a race to finish the book because it was one of the best thriller story lines I have read. It was certainly an unusual setting and I was unable to second guess the outcome. Lots more of the science fiction aspect was apparent and I really enjoyed reading the book more from this point onwards. I can see this would make a really good film as it is more of a visual storyline, however the writing was so descriptive, I really felt like I could see exactly what Isobel saw too.

I really wanted to give this book 5 stars but reduced it to 4 as it took so long to get going for me and reel me in. My thanks go to Netgalley and Quercus for a copy of the book for review.