Bombproof - Michael Robotham

I’m not sure what to make of this. Bombproof is a fun and an enjoyable thriller, but it really, really doesn’t feel like a Michael Robotham novel. Former DI Ruiz is here sure enough, and although retired he’s still the right man for the job when there is a girl missing and he’s asked to help out, but what are we to make of her brother Sami Macbeth, an ex-con just released from prison who seems to have gotten caught up in a terrorist bombing of the London Underground while trying to free her from the clutches of some dangerous and influential London gangsters?

Sami’s extraordinary run of bad luck continues through a series of escalating disasters, which sees his face plastered across the TV and has everyone from half of the London underworld to the SAS and Special Terrorism Units after him on a shoot-to-kill basis. All of this however has the feel of parody, picking up on the public’s fears of terrorist bombings and the casual xenophobia and racism that lies behind it, and playing it for some dubious satire. That’s fair enough and quite fun, but really, the plot is far from credible and all the characters from the head of the counter-terrorism unit to the unconvincing London gangsters are one-dimensional. I don’t recognise in Bombproof anything of the Michael Robotham who normally writes on a deeper and more personal level than this.

Taken on its own terms, even though part of me was horrified at the tastelessness and improbability of the plot, Bombproof is indeed a fun and a thrilling read and I literally couldn’t put the book down. I’m sure other readers coming fresh to this will enjoy it immensely, but I just couldn’t come to terms with this as a Michael Robotham thriller.

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