The Accident by Linwood Barclay

Glen Barber isn't the only person in the small town of Milford with things on his mind. The recession has been bad for his construction business, especially after a mysterious fire destroys one of his buildings. But everyone else in Milford seems to have problems too, as the financial pressures begin to pinch. Glen's troubles, however, are about to escalate to a whole new level. His wife Sheila has her own plans for getting them out of their financial jam, but these come to an abrupt halt when her car is found at the scene of a drunk-driving accident that took three lives. Not only is she dead, but it appears she was the cause of the accident. Suddenly Glen has to deal with a potent mixture of emotions: grief at the loss of his wife, along with anger at her reckless behaviour that leaves their young daughter motherless. If only he could convince himself that Sheila wasn't responsible for the tragedy - but as he looks deeper into the circumstances and begins to realise just how many secrets 
lurk behind Milford's idyllic facade, he may have to face something much, much worse...


Linwood Barclay is another of those authors who I look forward to each year releasing a new novel. He is a brilliant author and is able to write crime fiction full of twists and turns and always finishes his books with a twist that hits the reader with a shock!


The Accident is his latest book, released 1 September 2011. It tells the story of Glen Barber, owner of a construction business, who is facing financial difficulties after a mysterious fire burnt his latest build down. There is also the sudden and unexpected death of his wife following a car accident where tests show she was drunk when driving, something which was completely out of character. The mystery continues when his daughter's best friend's mum also dies in suspicious circumstances.


The book is, as ever in Linwood Barclay's books, excellent written, where the readers are lead through the story at a fast pace, gaining pieces of information along the way.  There is plenty of mystery, intrigue and despair within the book. The characters are all every day people, with the main male characters all having decent jobs, however the women are trying to earn a few extra pennies to supplement their husbands income - however there are consequences to this. The characters are all people you would find in any community and I really felt for Glen, worrying about his dead wife and also his daughter who is affected by both the death of her mum, but  also the death of her best friends mum too. All the characters suffer a full range of emotions throughout this book and I, as the reader, also felt much anger, frustration and confusion throughout the book as Glen Barber tries to uncover what happened to his wife before she died in the accident.


I would definitely recommend this book to crime lovers of all ages. Linwood Barclay has many fans but I think that with this book many more people will become fans. 


I received this book through the Amazon Vine program.