ARC REVIEW: Liberation Street – by Laurence Westwood #buddyread

Title: Liberation Street
(Philip Ye #2)
Author: Laurence Westwood
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Detective
First published: January 16th 2023
Publisher: Shikra Press
Finished reading: September 5th 2023
Pages: 831

“People are people. Don’t get fooled by a fancy uniform. Some people are good, some people are bad – but most of us are somewhere in between.”

*** A copy of this book was kindly provided to me by the author in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! ***

REVIEW

Even though there is a whole ocean and thousands of kilometres separating us, Nicki (Jersey in the Channel Islands) and myself (Argentina) are always able to make our buddy reads work… We actually buddy read the first book The Willow Woman back in 2019 and it was a huge success, so of course we HAD to read this sequel together as well. I know that Liberation Street can seem a bit daunting both due to its huge cast of characters and its whopping 800+ pages, but there is just something about the way this story is woven together that makes it extremely readable. We certainly had a lot of fun discussing our progress and comparing thoughts on Twitter along the way!

While you can technically read Liberation Street as a stand-alone, I would personally advice to read The Willow Woman first. It’s a great introduction to both the Chinese setting and the different characters in play, and it will provide insight in both past events and why certain characters behave the way they do. The first book is just as fantastic as this sequel, so you will be in for a treat in the first place! Liberation Street takes place some time after the first book ended, and while the two cases that are investigated are completely new, the events of the first book still have its impact.

One of the things that makes this story stand out for me is its Chinese setting. It’s not often that I get to visit China while reading, and I do love a good dose of armchair travel with my fiction. Liberation Street offers you a true goldmine filled with Chinese culture, and the descriptions are both thorough and vivid. I really felt like I was right there along with the characters, and the incorporation of local culture as well as spirituality was fantastic. The paranormal aspect of this story might not have been as present as in the first book, but it still added an unique twist to this detective thriller. Philip Ye’s connection to the spirit world and its contradiction with other aspects of his personality really take the story to the next level for me.

As you might have guessed with a story this long, the plot itself is quite complex. There are so many different characters and storylines, and this can be a bit daunting in the beginning… But somehow this complexity only works in favor of this story. There is a helpful index where all the characters are mentioned though, so it’s easy to check if you don’t remember who exactly a character is or how they fit into the plot. The abundance of storylines in Liberation Street somehow doesn’t get confusing at all, and this has a lot to do with the way the plot has been build up step by step. There is something extremely engaging and readable about it all, and the different storylines and characters are surprisingly easy to keep apart. I could also really appreciate how the different storylines slowly started to connect, and the POV switches were an excellent tool to add more suspense as well as plot twists.

There are a LOT of characters incorporated into Liberation Street, but some are more present than others. It was especially great to see favorites including Fatty Deng, Ma, Xu Ya and Philip Ye again! The rest of the cast is a mix of already known characters and new introductions, and they all added their little something to the plot. The two murder cases are both intriguing, and I really enjoyed seeing both investigations develop and evolve over time. The plot itself is well balanced with an intriguing mix of detective thriller, paranormal, humor and historical facts.

As you might have already guessed, I really enjoyed my time with Liberation Street, and our buddy read with Nicki was another success. If you enjoy a well written, intricate and well constructed detective thriller with a foreign setting and an unique angle, I can highly recommend both books of this series.