Book Review: What Have We Done by Alex Finlay

 My Rating:⭐⭐⭐

Twenty-five years ago 5 teenagers buried a secret in the grounds of Saviour House – a foster home for homeless teenagers – a place that was supposed to be a safe haven for children who were orphans or wards of the State but was not quite so. After all these years one of them is murdered and there have been attempts on the lives of the remaining four. It seems that someone knows what they did all those years ago.

In the past twenty-five years, the five have gone their separate ways – Ben, a federal judge; Nico, a television producer with gambling debts; Donnie, a fading rock star whose attempts at sobriety are mostly unsuccessful; Artemis, a successful tech entrepreneur and Jenna, assassin-turned suburban homemaker – and someone is out to get them! Why , after all these years, is someone targeting them? Will this secret from their past upend their present lives? Will they be able to find out who is behind it all before anyone else gets hurt? Add to this the assassins (with an unusual weapon of choice) who are assigned the task of killing them and you’ve got an interesting thriller on your hands!

What Have We Done by Alex Finlay is an action-packed thriller with exciting twists and turns. The narrative is shared from the perspectives of Jenna, Donnie and Nico. The plot has potential and will have the reader trying to figure out the who and the what and the why from the get-go. However, it wasn’t quite as gripping, complex or tight-knit as I hoped it would be. The pace drags in parts and I didn’t really like any of the main characters (though Jenna’s assassin-turned-housewife backstory was interesting) and I felt that their shared history, which is shared in bits and pieces throughout the narrative the should have been better developed. Another problem I had with the narrative was the abrupt switching between the past and the present-day events, which took a while to get used to. However, I did like the way the story eventually unfolded (loved the literary references as a major clue toward the end) and my eagerness to know the who and the why kept me interested.

Overall, while I did not dislike this one, I wasn’t quite bowled over by it. But I am eager to read more from Alex Finlay in the future. I really hope he gives us another book featuring FBI Special Agent Sarah Keller (from The Night Shift and Every Last Fear).

Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the digital review copy of What Have They Done. All opinions expressed in this review are my own. This book is due to be released on March 7, 2023.