Publication Date: September 10, 2024
For fans of Cottonmouths by Kelly J. Ford comes Negative Girl: an evocative, moody, neo-noir thriller that explores obsession and people dying across America’s forgotten spaces.
Martin Wade lived hard in his youth, but unlike many of his former bandmates and roadie friends, he didn’t die young. Instead he hit the recovery path, cleaned up his life, and became a private investigator in a dying city in upstate New York.
When his heavily tattooed and scarred assistant Valerie sets up an appointment with a young woman who needs help keeping her biological father away from her, none of the three realize that the father is Martin’s old bandmate, still using, and on a destructive path that will soon be headed straight for Martin’s clean life. As Martin struggles, Valerie becomes increasingly obsessed with their new client’s life.
Negative Girl by Libby Cudmore is a mystery thriller novel conveyed from the perspectives of Martin Wade, a former rockstar and recovered addict working as a private investigator, and his assistant, Valerie, a young woman who moved back to Perrine to escape her scarred path.
Martin comes face-to-face with his tragic past when a young woman seeks his help to keep her estranged father away from her. Upon further investigation, Martin discovers the father is his former friend and bandmate, Ron. The young woman, Ron’s daughter, known to Martin as “Janie,” was taken away from her parents at a young age to live with Nora, a family friend. During her time away, Janie became a talented violinist and, unbeknownst to Nora, the lead singer in a rock band.
The story takes a dramatic twist when Janie’s body washes up on the shores of the river. The police find drugs and alcohol in her system and rule it an accidental drowning. Knowing there has to be more to the story, Valerie and Martin set up an investigation of their own. As they peel away the case’s layers, they start to chip away at their past. Readers follow along as more of Valerie and Martin’s stories are revealed.
Will Valerie and Ron be able to find out what happened to Janie? Will they each be able to come to terms with their past choices, and, most importantly, can they forgive themselves?
Negative Girl is a great read for mystery, crime, and thriller lovers. The novel is fast-paced, easy to follow, and takes readers on multiple twists and turns that keep the story engaging and exciting.
I mostly enjoyed the novel. However, I got a bit hung up on the relationship between Martin and Valerie. There’s quite an age gap between them, so at times, their relationship was written as a father-daughter relationship which made sense to me. She’d check up on him, invite him to things so he wouldn’t be lonely and he was protective of her. However, later on in the novel, I felt like their relationship took a turn, and it seemed like there was a sexual attraction between them. For example, Martin kisses Valerie on the forehead, and then Valerie thinks that she wants to undress in front of him. They both ended up with other people in the end, so I don’t believe the confusing sexual tension portions of their relationship were necessary, and for me, it took away from the story.
I enjoyed Negative Girl and recommend giving it a read. Two people who have spent years running away from their past, find themselves in the middle of a murder case that will bring them face to face with everything they’ve ran from.
LIBBY CUDMORE is a Shamus and Black Orchid award winner and the author of the acclaimed The Big Rewind. Her Wade and Jacks stories have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Tough and the Anthony-nominated anthology Lawyers, Guns & Money: Crime Fiction Inspired by The Music of Warren Zevon (co-edited with Art Taylor). Her other publications include The Dark, Smokelong Quarterly, MonkeyBicycle, HAD and others. She lives in Upstate NY with her husband and cats.
