Review: Panic by Catherine Jinks

Logic is a funny thing. If you read any discourse for well-established IPs, you'll find people arguing about characters acting illogically or making decisions that don't make sense. These criticisms are usually countered with the argument that people often make illogical decisions due to their backgrounds or circumstances, and to a certain extent this rings true. Humans are emotional and fickle creatures and more often than not our decisions are rooted in complex emotions over hard, cold logic, but there are limits. 

Panic by Catherine Jinks is a thriller set in Bathurst Australia. It follows Bronte, a woman with an embarrassing past that takes a job caring for an elderly woman with dementia in exchange for room and board. Almost instantly, Bronte is confronted with the fact that her new hosts are a group of sovereign citizens with a dubious grasp of the law.

The writing is decent and Jinks has clearly done her research. While at first glance it may seem like the characters that Bronte encounters are unrealistic caricatures, a quick look at any sov cit video compilation on YouTube will show just how left of field many of these people are. Despite the accurate portrayal of sov cits, the novel falls down in most other areas. 

Most pressing is the decision making that gets Bronte into her situation in the first place. Even before she meets her host Veda, red flags are flying about the place that she is about to call home, and then when Bronte finally meets her, she's given no time to settle before the sovereign citizen type behaviour rears its ugly head. Despite this, Bronte decides to continue onto the property anyway. The novel does go a long way to explain that she is running away from prolonged harassment and feels like she can't go back home, but ultimately I don't think that's enough of an explanation. 

Veda and everyone with her goes from crazy decision to crazy decision without letting up and Bronte simply has no actual reason to stick around. Logically, it makes no sense and at the early points in the novel, she has no emotional reason to stay either. 

Even so, I was willing to let that slide as the novel went on. I found the novel’s central mystery to be intriguing and I was starting to find myself compelled, only to be frustrated as the novel started to ramp up. Bronte's internal dialogue is filled with references to her formal training and she seemed overly concerned with protecting her reputation, even in situations where her life’s in danger. I wish I could have given this a higher score as I love a good sov cit romp, but ultimately Panic hamstrung itself.

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Book Details

Author: Catherine JinksLength: 336 PagesGenre: ThrillerAvailable January 7th from Amazon.