Assessment:
Plot/Idea: This novel is built on a solid premise: an innocent man discovers that he has been set up to look like a suspect in his colleague's murder. Trafford skillfully builds tension and uncertainty as the protagonist pieces together the events of the night in question and attempts to clear his name.
Prose: The prose is clear, concise, and filled with immersive details.
Originality: While the premise is somewhat familiar, Trafford effectively develops the St. Louis setting, and a unique set of circumstances behind a white-collar crime.
Character Development/Execution: Gray is a well-crafted, complex man, whose trauma and distress in the aftermath of his attack is convincingly depicted. Readers will welcome the unexpected developments and the level of psychological intrigue the author explores.
Date Submitted: May 09, 2022
Featuring a last-minute chance at redemption, the series opener Merchants Bridge is an engrossing thriller in which an affable attorney fights to prove his innocence— and to regain his sense of reality.
"Local readers will savor the local color."
"Trafford skillfully builds tension and uncertainty as the protagonist pieces together the events of the night in question and attempts to clear his name....Readers will welcome the unexpected developments and the level of psychological intrigue the author explores."
Merchants Bridge takes readers on a nightmare journey along a twisted maze of possibilities in which what is real and what may be only imagined becomes nearly impossible to separate. This is psychological suspense at its best.
