LE MANS a novel (RUTHLESS TO WIN) [Kindle Edition]

I thought that this was a wonderful book for anyone who likes motor racing. I learnt a lot about racing generally and Le Mans in particular. It is a good thriller for anyone to read really, so I can highly recommend it.

The only annoyance was that my copy included a long preview of another story, so the main story had ended when the Kindle had reached only 76%.

Le Mans is the author's first book in her Ruthless To Win series, set in and around the motor racing world. I read book 2 first so knew a little about these characters. As I understand it, each book will be set around a different character, but all in the same world of "Cartwright-Armitage" racing.

Sometimes the story got a bit bogged down in technicalities, but other readers might like it .

I also think that the characters are bit "too nice to be true". The world that Mallory finds herself in with money thrown at everything, expensive gifts are given left, right and centre seems a bit too wonderful. OR is that I don't know of these things and life really is like that in the world of top-class motor sports :)

I do like this world that Dakota Franklin has created. The books are an easy clean read with strong female characters. There were no profanities in the book and even though you'd imaging the male world of motor sports would be full of rough people, Cartwright-Armitage are the gentlemen of this world.

There's a lot to like about this novel, not least the central character who has a nice line in self-deprecating humour and is very engaging.

The background characters are interesting, though a few do seem slightly sterotypical, and the plot rattles along at a good pace. I did find myself zoning out slightly in some of the passages that delivered quite a lot of technical information about racing but nevertheless I don't think you need to be knowledgeable about the subject (I'm certainly not) to enjoy the story and if you are an aficionado I think these passages would add to your enjoyment.

My difficulty with the book, and the reason for the lukewarm rating, is the style of the writing.

The author keeps switching to the present tense, usually when describing a newly-introduced character, then switching back to past tense. Sometimes she switches back and forth in the course of one paragraph, and it really gets quite irritating. I tried to see it as a stylistic choice by the author rather than just poor writing, but with mixed success.

On top of this, some of the dialogue is really very stilted. For example, one character wishes another well for a forthcoming race with the words "I shall hold thumbs for you before my television". As the character saying this is a no-nonsense English ex-policeman it was impossible to imagine him coming out with such a line.

Apparently a series is planned. I certainly feel the author has the character-creating and plotting skills necessary to produce a good book, but I really do think she needs to work on her general writing skills if she's going to do herself justice.