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One Good Turn (Jackson Brodie #2)

3.76 of 5 stars 3.76 · rating details · 9,540 ratings · 1,177 reviews

"Atkinson's bright voice rings on every page, and her sly and wry observations move the plot as swiftly as suspense turns the pages of a thriller."-San Francisco Chronicle

Two years after the events of Case Histories left him a retired millionaire, Jackson Brodie has followed Julia, his occasional girlfriend and former client, to Edinburgh for its famous summer arts festiva...more

Paperback, 448 pages

Published September 10th 2007 by Back Bay Books (first published 2006)

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Dec 27, 2007 brook rated it 2 of 5 stars

it took me long enough to finish this one, which says a lot. i'm the person who will willingly give up sleep, food, social interaction and general human-like activities to read a good book.

i really liked kate atkinson's case histories. it's been awhile since i read it, but it left enough of an impression that i was willing to dive into this one with little knowledge of what it was about, or what people thought of it. all in all, it had a very slow start for me. in fact, that was the biggest obs...more

7 likes · like · see review

Jan 10, 2012 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: buddy-reads-with-jemidar, crime-fiction, kindle

This is the second novel in the series of which ex-soldier, ex-police officer and newly wealthy ex-private detective Jackson Brodie is the chief protagonist. Just as in the first book in the series, Case Histories, the story is told from the point of view of a number of different characters, whose lives intersect with and whose actions directly and indirectly affect each other.

A recurrent image in the novel is that of Matryoshka dolls – the Russian dolls which fit inside each other. The image i...more

13 likes · like · see review

Apr 07, 2009 Jessica rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mysteries

In this follow-up to Case Histories, we find retired detective Jackson Brodie in Edinburgh, where his girlfriend Julia is appearing in a not-very-good play. Brodie stumbles into a set of interconnected events -- a road rage incident interrupted by a meek writer of popular cozy mysteries; the murder of an over-the-hill comedian who had imposed himself at the writer's house; the disappearance of the body of a young woman wearing crucifix earrings and bearing the card of a shady cleaning service; t...more

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Mar 17, 2011 Beth rated it 2 of 5 stars

ONE GOOD TURN by Kate Atkinson begins with a road rage incident involving one crazy guy beating a man with a baseball bat and another man, a wimpy writer of popular crime novels, knocking the crazy guy down with his laptop computer. From there we meet all sorts of seemingly unrelated characters who all become connected.

It's actually a pretty good and simple story. But here's what I guess happened.

My guess is that Atkinson had a pretty good short story. Someone (publisher, editor, agent, whoever)...more

7 likes · like · see review

Jan 15, 2009 Linda rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-crime, british-authors

Stephen King recommended this author in a book column that he writes for Entertainment Weekly. (It was lying around at work and I needed something to read!)I took his recommendation seriously because in his column he went on to recommend "...and all the books of Robert Goddard."

I love to come across new authors. Years ago I just happened upon Goddard and avidly read several of his tomes before I ran out of the energy needed to handle the underlying sinisterness of his stories.

Now I get to go t...more Stephen King recommended this author in a book column that he writes for Entertainment Weekly. (It was lying around at work and I needed something to read!)I took his recommendation seriously because in his column he went on to recommend "...and all the books of Robert Goddard."

I love to come across new authors. Years ago I just happened upon Goddard and avidly read several of his tomes before I ran out of the energy needed to handle the underlying sinisterness of his stories.

Now I get to go through all the books of Kate Atkinson. She writes with a light touch while telling a great, inter-connected story which covers policing, single-parenting, bad art, corporate corruption, & the exploitation of sex workers. An episode of road-rage starts the One Good Turn of the title into many more good turns. But the good turns are interspersed with some pretty nasty deeds including murder. Read her soon so we can start a fan club. Linda

Note April 15, 2010. I was reviewing my reviews and found that my review of Atkinson's One Good Turn gave me no clue of the story that so fascinated me. So for my aging brain, I've added the Amazon review.
Amazon.com Review
Kate Atkinson began her career with a winner: Behind the Scenes at the Museum, which captured the Whitbread First Novel Award. She followed that success with four other books, the last of which was Case Histories, her first foray into the mystery-suspense-detective genre. In that book she introduced detective Jackson Brodie, who reopened three cold cases and ended up a millionaire. A great deal happened in-between.

In One Good Turn Jackson returns, following his girlfriend, Julia the actress, to the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh. He manages to fall into all kinds of trouble, starting with witnessing a brutal attack by "Honda Man" on another man stuck in a traffic jam. Is this road rage or something truly sinister? Another witness is Martin Canning, better known as Alex Blake, the writer. Martin is a shy, withdrawn, timid sort who, in a moment of unlikely action, flings a satchel at the attacker and spins him around, away from his victim. Gloria Hatter, wife of Graham, a millionaire property developer who is about to have all his secrets uncovered, is standing in a nearby queue with a friend when the attack takes place. There is nastiness afoot, and everyone is involved. Nothing is coincidental.

Through a labyrinthine plot which is hard to follow because the points of view are constantly changing, the real story is played out, complete with Russians, false and mistaken identities, dead bodies, betrayals, and all manner of violent encounters. Jackson gets pulled in to the investigation by Louise Monroe, a police detective and mother of an errant 14-year-old. There might be yet another novel to follow which will take up the connection those two forge in this book. Or, Jackson might just go back to France and feed apples to the local livestock. (less)

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Dec 13, 2011 Wyma rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011-4-or-5-stars

Remember when you first read Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury? A story told by 3 family members, each in turn speaking to the reader, telling the same story from their point of view. And you'd never read anything quite like it, and still haven't. Until McCann's Let the Great World Spin told a story of Phillipe Petit who walked a tightrope between two skyscrapers in New York City in 1974, and featured several different leading characters.

Let the Great world Spin, though, moves from character to...more Remember when you first read Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury? A story told by 3 family members, each in turn speaking to the reader, telling the same story from their point of view. And you'd never read anything quite like it, and still haven't. Until McCann's Let the Great World Spin told a story of Phillipe Petit who walked a tightrope between two skyscrapers in New York City in 1974, and featured several different leading characters.

Let the Great world Spin, though, moves from character to character, back and forth in time, and gradually reveals how these characters' lives are related. And their stories are told in third person, not in the voice of the character.

Just recently I finished Laura Lippman's galley of The Most Dangerous Thing, a story of a neighborhood, the families who inhabit it, and a murder that is hushed up by one or more of them. Although Lippman uses third person narrative, she also gives us a great deal of dialogue so that it almost seems to be told by one neighbor then another.

Lippman recommended one of her favorite authors, Kate Atkinson, so I read One Good Turn. Here Atkinson heightens the suspense of a murder mystery by circling the characters, focusing on one and then another so that we get several stories in one.

This book is full of good turns, by the way. Not just the turning of the narrator from one character to another, but also the turn of one life effects a turn in another. And the author reveals clues to the murder as well as hints of the outcome for each life as she twists and turns her way through the novel.

Now none of these subsequent books do quite what Faulkner did which was to essentially write three stories of the same event, without interruption of each person's narrative as I recall. Still, the style seems to have its origin in this method of Faulkner's (and no doubt many authors before him.) Apparently it's a trend (like the first person narrative was a trend of hard boiled detective stories,)one I finally recognized when I reached for my next book, A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan.

This style of storytelling enriches One Good Turn as we see how the same event plays out in different lives. Some lives are fully and dramatically exploited in the story and others just tease us a little at the beginning and the end of the book.

This particular method, while painstaking to convincingly employ, makes the novel more plausible, more like real life. For the reader, however, it can seem as though the conclusion is too scattered, suspense built through a narrative device rather than gripping storytelling. But that's only occasionally in One Good Turn. It's a very good story, well told with some quite likeable people in it. And there is an unmistakably cheeky author behind the narrator, behind the characters. Recommended. (less)

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Nov 08, 2009 Annabelle rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a very slow start, as Atkinson turns chapter, to chapter from one character to another to set the stage of people who say a car accident, where a brute comes out with a baseball bat and is hit by a computer from a bystander stopping his attack. The character development is great, even though I liked some better than others. There is Martin, the rich mystery writer with social anxiety. Jackson, the rich ex cop, bored living in France, and wrangling with his actress girlfriend. Gloria the...more

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Apr 24, 2008 Rose rated it 2 of 5 stars

One Good Turn is Atkinson's second novel to feature a character named Jackson Brodie, though I didn't realize it was part of a series until I had finished the book. That didn't seem to impact the story. The book is sort of a mystery, but it doesn't completely belong to the genre. There is a detective, and a crime, and a series of plot twists and turns, but I don't think the author was trying to write a piece of genre fiction. Had she tried to do just that, she may have been more successful; as i...more One Good Turn is Atkinson's second novel to feature a character named Jackson Brodie, though I didn't realize it was part of a series until I had finished the book. That didn't seem to impact the story. The book is sort of a mystery, but it doesn't completely belong to the genre. There is a detective, and a crime, and a series of plot twists and turns, but I don't think the author was trying to write a piece of genre fiction. Had she tried to do just that, she may have been more successful; as it is, the book falls flat.

The novel is not a mystery, but it's not a particularly enlightening piece of literature either, nor is it a portrait of especially intriguing characters. Like in Atkinson's novel Behind the Scenes at the Museum, the characters here each play a part in a much larger drama, the full extent of which is not revealed until the final act. There is a plot, and the story could have been captivating, but the problem is that Atkinson never allows us to be completely swept away in it. Her characters are flat, which makes the intricate plot seem silly. She tries to inject her characters with life, but instead fills them with sarcastic comments and absurd (but not quite comic) thoughts that reveal more about the author than the characters. Atkinson is just too present in the novel. She's on every page, shouting to the reader "Hey, this is just a book! Don't believe this crazy plot. Don't be fooled by the outrageous characters. They aren't real!" Which of course they aren't. But that's not why I'm reading.

I suppose one could argue that an author might purposely remind her readers of the fictional elements of her work in order to reveal a truth. Perhaps by drawing a reader into the story world, then exposing it as mere fiction, the author draws attention in an illuminating way to the contrast between fiction and reality. I don't believe this is Atkinson's aim in One Good Turn. Here, there's no balance between the larger-than-life plot and reality, making the story seem absurd and the characters merely characters. Thus, I found the novel neither enlightening nor enjoyable.(less)

9 likes · like · see review

Sep 05, 2007 Emily rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

One Good Turn was a decent read. Good for lazy summer days, it's one step up from your typical beach book, but far from being great literature. I've also read Atkinson's Case Histories (also decent), but I guess it didn't make all that much of an impact, as I was almost halfway through the book before I realized that One Good Turn has the same characters as Case Histories. Then I also realized that One Good Turn follows pretty much the same formula as Case Histories, which is: take a mystery, em...more

3 likes · like · see review

Aug 25, 2007 Khaya rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mysteriesthrillers

I was mostly impressed with this book. The writing and characterization were excellent, and it was literary in the sense that there was more to the book than the story itself; it was crafted in a very clever and symbolic way. The only flaw, in my view, was that it took a long time for the story to develop and/or become clear; there was a lot of focus on characterization which I actually enjoyed, but I also felt like I was waiting for things to actually happen. For much of the book I felt that I...more

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Sep 13, 2009 Vicky rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: contemporary-fiction

I stopped reading this book halfway through, which is very unusual for me. I had been very entertained by it initially -- loved Atkinson's astringent wit, her hilariously apt metaphors, her willingness to say the things we usually just think but daren't say aloud. And the story was suspenseful, a page turner. Yet there came a point where I didn't want to read any more of it. The same sharp-eyed malice that had entertained me initially eventually got on my nerves. I remember having the same react...more

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Dec 29, 2007 Anne rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Like another reviewer, I didn't connect this book to Atkinson's previous novel, Case Histories (which, incidentally, I preferred). In this one, the character development - perhaps because there were so many characters - seemed shallow for some, and unlike in the previous novel, in which motivations became clear as the story progressed, in this one those motivations did not develop but were dropped like bombs in the middle of the story. Even though it lacked the nuance of the previous story, One...more

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Oct 21, 2011 Jon rated it 3 of 5 stars

Well-rounded characters and snappy dialogue in this fairly leisurely whodunnit (or maybe rather whatsgoingon). There are no hidden clues here--just hints at coincidences and connections that will become clearer only as we learn more. Entertaining, with lots of irony, both gentle and sharp, but too digressive and wordy for my taste. Rather like P.D. James with a sense of humor. Twice Jackson Brodie (Atkinson's sleuth) was seconds from death at the end of a chapter. The next chapter picked up the...more

1 like · like · see review

Nov 06, 2011 Lauren Fidler rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: abusive-relationships, authority-problems, bad-ass-protagonist-names, bad-mothers, close-your-eyes-do-it-for-england, clunky, convoluted-plot, crime-drama, dysfunctional-family-drama, makes-me-wish-i-had-a-map, mystery, not-first-in-series, wish-it-were-better

oh jackson brodie, where did we go wrong???

i loved, loved, loved Case Histories and was very excited to read the second installment. i admire atkinson for her ability to weave a complicated, intertwined web of a plot, but the beginning of this book just lagged for pages and pages.

first, there are too many characters. while following the dissolving relationship between jackson and julia, the reader has to contend with the milquetoasty martin whose writer alter ego is far more compelling than his...more

1 like · like · see review

Nov 08, 2011 Anna rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2011, mystery-thriller

I loved Case Histories, the first book in the Jackson Brodie series, but was less sure about this one. It was....odd, but odd in a good way!

It’s part murder mystery, part tour-de-farce, part complete confusion. As with Case Histories, it’s character lead rather than plot lead, which I enjoyed. I grew very fond of some of the characters and liked being inside their heads as they took us through their thoughts, relived their pasts and got caught up in this crazy story in both comical and touching...more

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Jul 31, 2011 Woodwren rated it 5 of 5 stars

I remember a scolding from one of my high school English teachers to the effect that my classmates and I should only read books that made us better people and stop wasting our time with the other stuff. I'm not sure Atkinson's Jackson Brodie novels would rise to her standard. They're probably frustrating for mystery readers who value focused, logical plots and a clear sense of right and wrong in a novel, too. But I love these books. Atkinson's writing, her characters, and her observations of the...more

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Apr 23, 2011 Shannon rated it 3 of 5 stars

I enjoyed Case Histories by Kate Atkinson, so I thought I'd give One Good Turn a try. Like its predecessor, it features Jackson Brodie. Jackson's a likable character and I found myself feeling a lot like him as I read his internal dialogue in this book. One Good Turn finds Jackson in Edinburgh with his girlfriend, who is there to act in a play at the annual festival. Through a series of events, he finds himself embroiled in a series of small - and not so small - crimes.

It's been a while since I...more

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Mar 01, 2011 Jeff rated it 2 of 5 stars

Since I really liked Case Histories I was eager to read the next book by Kate Atkinson. Guess maybe it was a little too much of a good thing. I did finish it, but not with the eagerness I raced through it's predecessor. Although it also features the same detective, the likeable Jackson Brodie, he gets a bit tiresome by book's end, as do a number of the other characters. The plot seemed forced and uninvolving. A disappointing follow-up to an excellent debut.

In an afterword to Case Histories, the...more

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Aug 25, 2010 Djrmel rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: z2010-read, contemporary, fiction, mystery

Atkinson uses the same story telling technique that worked so well in "Case Histories" - several mysteries unravel at the same time with characters slowing crossing from one to other until it's all brought together in the end. However, in Case Histories, each mystery stood on its own merit. In this book, I felt like the characters were supposed to be the story, and the crimes that brought them together were padding. Excessive, smothering, too heavy padding that would have been okay on an episod...more

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Oct 08, 2009 Lance Greenfield Mitchell rated it 3 of 5 stars

Multi-threaded crime thriller

Have you ever seen a painting that has so much detail in the background that the main subject becomes almost invisible to your eye? Have you ever listened to a piece of music that has so many intricate harmonies that the melody becomes obscured? Either way, try to imagine the equivalent book. You now have the base format of One Good Turn in your mind. This story has a brilliant plot, but it takes quite a while to get past all of the memories of the characters and the...more

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Feb 05, 2009 LJ rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: contemporary_post_1945, england, male_author, mystery, police_procedural

ONE GOOD TURN (Pol. Proc-Jackson Brodie-England-Cont)- VG
Atkinson, Kate – 2nd in series
Doubleday, 2006, US Hardcover – ISBN: 0385608004

First Sentence: He was lost.

During the Edinburgh Festival, a case of road rage triggers a sequence of events that impacts a lot of lives. Author Martin Canning, throws his laptop at a driver attacking another driver with a baseball bat. He goes with the victim to the hospital and then hotel to ensure the man is alright. The next morning, the man is goes as is Mar...more ONE GOOD TURN (Pol. Proc-Jackson Brodie-England-Cont)- VG
Atkinson, Kate – 2nd in series
Doubleday, 2006, US Hardcover – ISBN: 0385608004

First Sentence: He was lost.

During the Edinburgh Festival, a case of road rage triggers a sequence of events that impacts a lot of lives. Author Martin Canning, throws his laptop at a driver attacking another driver with a baseball bat. He goes with the victim to the hospital and then hotel to ensure the man is alright. The next morning, the man is goes as is Martin’s money and wallet, but Martin has the gun he found hidden in the man’s bag.

Ex-soldier, ex-cop, ex-PI Jackson Brodie also witnessed the road rage but didn’t get involved until found the body of a dead woman floating in the sea and nearly drowned unsuccessfully trying to retrieve it. DI Louise Monroe is the investigating officer on a case where no one is whom they say.

Reading Kate Atkinson reminds me of a puzzle box. There are a lot of pieces that you view one-by-one, but that come together to form a whole picture. Here we have a lot of characters, each introduced separately so we get to know them, each distinct, not all likable.

In fact, we see much of the story as it relates to Martin, a timid, rather reclusive writer. The contrast of Martin, to the strength of the rest of the characters, is part of what makes everything work so well. They are brought together through a confluence of events that takes the reader on a wild ride to an unexpected ending.

What makes Atkinson such fun to read is her droll style. She is a literate author with a remarkable way with words. She cushions the violent blows in a glove of wry humor. It is hard to explain Atkinson’s writing and it is definitely not for everyone, but I find her a delight.

That said, this wasn’t my favorite book, as I felt it did bog down in places. I do feel she really comes into her own with next book, “When Will There Be Good News.” However, once you become a fan, as I have done, her books are a pleasure to read.
(less)

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Feb 02, 2012 Melissa rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: i-cry-foul

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Nov 16, 2009 Bibliophile rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2007, 2009, mystery-and-suspense, fiction, own, buy-for-kindle

I don't like Kate Atkinson's One Good Turn quite as much as Case Histories which introduced us to Jackson Brodie, because THAT mystery had a lot of powerful and painful resonances for the principals, including Jackson and this one is more comical (although also at times deeply scary.) But I adore Kate Atkinson's writing and she does a grand job with the mystery part of it while still having all these wonderful, wonderful characters (not to mention the hilarious "pastiche" of "cozy" mysteries tha...more

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May 07, 2013 Bjorn rated it 4 of 5 stars

Modern society is built on the idea that everyone minds their own business and don’t interfere. If you see something horrible happen you might pick up your phone and snap a digital image of it, but actually do something? Why? It’s Somebody Else’s Problem.

So when a traffic accident on a crowded street in Edinburgh appears to be leading up to outright murder, all the witnesses just stand around watching as if it’s on TV. All except a shy mystery writer who has spent his entire life on the sideline...more Modern society is built on the idea that everyone minds their own business and don’t interfere. If you see something horrible happen you might pick up your phone and snap a digital image of it, but actually do something? Why? It’s Somebody Else’s Problem.

So when a traffic accident on a crowded street in Edinburgh appears to be leading up to outright murder, all the witnesses just stand around watching as if it’s on TV. All except a shy mystery writer who has spent his entire life on the sidelines and has no idea why he’s interfering, but manages to save a man’s life. And all he gets for it is to be drawn, along with a bunch of other “spectators”, into a story that turns their lives upside down.

One Good Turn is a standalone sequel to the brilliant Case Histories, and just like its predecessor it’s hard to place in a genre; it looks a bit like your typical crime novel with a humorous touch, complete with mysterious deaths, human trafficking and an anti-hero who likes sad country music and can’t get his relationships with women to work. But just like the Russian dolls that pop out throughout, there are layers here, boxes within boxes, and a good dose of serious thinking under the comedy.

Not completely unlike Baxter in McEwan’s Saturday, the bad guy here isn’t really a mystery; we know who he is, and his job isn’t as much to be caught as to act as a catalyst for the other characters. The core of the novel isn’t the solution to a crime but the characters themselves, caught in the middle of life with all the little nicks and bruises that the years bring, and really much to caught up in their own lives to have time to deal with other peoples’... but they have to. In Not The End Of The World, Atkinson tried to fuse her contemporary storytelling with various myths, from the old Greeks to Buffy, and the result was... mixed, to say the least. She’s toned that down considerably here, and when for instance Robin Hood pops up in the corner of the character’s eyes here and there it only serves to underline the central themes of the novel, all those things that we all profess to agree with but rarely find a reason to actually adress in our everyday life. Is there such a thing as an unselfish deed? Are we really supposed to look after each other? What do you mean, my actions may have consequences for other people?

Towards the end, Atkinson may try a little too hard to tie everything together; not enough to break the illusion, just bend it a little. But while it’s not quite up there with Case Histories, One Good Turn delivers enough insightful, funny and realistic storytelling to outweigh its flaws, and just enough darkness to keep it from getting too sugary. It might be autumn in Atkinson’s Edinburgh, but even if it doesn’t end well for everyone who deserves it (or, indeed, ends at all – life goes on), I get a little bit of a warm fuzzy feeling from the book. I like Kate Atkinson.(less)

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May 04, 2013 Pat rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult, series, series-r-us, suspense-thriller

This intricate and engrossing tale examines an extreme case of road rage, the spiraling events due to it and the affect and effects of the people involved from various points of view. If you aren’t one for slowly gathering momentum or multiple points of view this may not be the read for you. However, if you have the patience to still with it you may find an interesting read between these covers.
There was a lot going on here and not necessarily to the good at all times. I couldn’t shake the feel...more

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Apr 23, 2013 Sandie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013-books, brit-lit, thrillers-and-mystery

When it comes to rendering unusual and amusing characters complete with a plethora of baggage inhabiting plots that, while engaging, are often convoluted and a little less than credible, Kate Atkinson is a virtual wizard with words. Her latest offering ONE GOOD TURN begins with an unusually violent case of road rage resulting from a fender bender. Witnesses to the attack on driver Paul Bradley include ex-private eye turned recently wealthy world traveler Jackson Brodie (protagonist of Ms. Atkins...more

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Apr 17, 2013 Pamela rated it 4 of 5 stars

Discussed this book last night at my Mystery Book club meeting. The group was divided between those who really loved the book and those that didn't. The major criticism of those who did not like this book was that the plot line was confusing, convaluded, and wasn't plausible or believable. Those of us who loved the book pointed to its major strenghts: the structure of the books was well-developed. Although the chapters weren't chronological and timelines jumped forwards and backwards, each chapt...more

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Apr 08, 2013 Nola rated it 3 of 5 stars

The last half of the book was absolutely gripping. I sat through the whole afternoon finishing it just to figure out what happened. It was better than Case Histories. I thought that she weaved the characters together a lot better than in Case Histories.

However, the first half of the book was tedious to read and hard to keep track of. At any given time be it couple of pages later, the next page, or within the same paragraph, her character's thought or placement in the story spontaneously changed...more

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Mar 22, 2013 Susan Oleksiw rated it 5 of 5 stars

Jackson Brodie arrives in Edinburgh to support his girlfriend, Julia, in her debut in a new play in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. On arrival he witnesses a road rage incident involving two men. Soon afterward he encounters one of the men a second time, and before long Brodie is under arrest. He quickly turns into a victim, suspect, and felon. His life is spiraling out of control but it's not nearly as bad as Martin Canning's situation. As a hack mystery writer, Canning (aka Alex Blake) has led...more

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Jul 06, 2012 Babette rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-suspense

I discovered and read Kate Atkinson a while before she became the source for another mystery series on PBS. I will have to watch the productions someday. The first book I read - Case Histories, was rather quirky (because of the characters) and seemed to ramble a bit (like Rankin's books until you get used to them), but I was astounded at her accomplishment by the end. With this second book in the Jackson Brody series, I suspected what was in store. I was not disappointed. The book is set in Edin...more

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About Kate Atkinson

Kate Atkinson was born in York and now lives in Edinburgh. Her first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, won the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and has been a critically acclaimed international bestselling author ever since.

She is the author of a collection of short stories, Not the End of the World, and of the critically acclaimed novels Human Croquet, Emotionally Weird, Case Histories, and...more

More about Kate Atkinson...

Books by Kate Atkinson

When Will There Be Good News? (Jackson Brodie, #3)

Started Early, Took My Dog (Jackson Brodie, #4)

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Quotes from One Good Turn

“They said love made you strong, but in Louise's opinion it made you weak. It corkscrewed into your heart and you couldn't get it out again, not without ripping your heart to pieces.” — 29 people liked it

“Love was the hardest thing. Don't let anyone ever tell you different.” — 17 people liked it

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title link	preview: One Good Turn
avg rating	preview: One Good Turn Goodreads rating: 3.76 (9540 ratings)
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BBCode	[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/501124.One_Good_Turn?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1344270121l/501124.jpg[/img][/url] [url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/501124.One_Good_Turn?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson[/url]

One Good Turn (Jackson Brodie #2)

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