I follow you . . . until you are mine by Peter James

Pan Macmillan, 2020. ISBN: 9781509816286.
(Age: Secondary/adult) Highly recommended. Set in Jersey, James' latest thriller is most unsettling. Dr Marcus Valentine is a distinguished gynae-oncologist, a leader in his field and looked up to by both his colleagues and patients alike. He is also an obsessive man - time is important and everything has its place.
While driving to work he almost runs a woman down. A woman who reminds him disturbingly of his first love. Georgie Maclean becomes a preoccupation which rapidly turns to an addiction.
Peter James is able to knit the lives of Georgie, her partner Roger Richardson and Marcus Valentine into an increasingly volatile dance. Valentine believes he is in control but he has to take ever more complicated steps to keep his passion secret.
After a plane crash involving Roger, Valentine takes charge of the surgery to save his life but deliberately omits to take care of a small problem which will eventually end in his death.
Georgie is also pregnant, a long awaited precious event. Valentine would also like to be rid of that troublesome addition. He does not wish to be saddled with another man's child. As his fixation with Georgie becomes more delusional he really believes that they will live together in a blissful loving partnership.
As James' narrative moves on the pace steadily increases as does the suspense. He has been able to paint the Dr Valentine as a pompous, self-opinionated sociopath a thoroughly dislikable character, while the reader's anxiety for Georgie and Richard steadily mounts as the story unfolds. A thoroughly satisfying page turner. Highly recommended.
Themes: Crime, New Jersey, Obsession, Thriller.
Mark Knight