Megan disappears after reporting that she believes she's being stalked. Then her flat-mate is murdered. A firm of security consultants finds that their computer network has been hacked by someone calling himself "Warlock". As the police get on to Megan's trail, it appears that she's not the person she claimed to be. What's going on?

Pretty weak really. I was listening to this story around the same time as reading The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest and couldn't help be reminded of Lisbeth Salander - Megan is another free-spirit who's an expert computer hacker and who isn't bothered about staying on the right side of the law.

But unlike Larsson, Murphy is not at all convincing on the technical detail; she's of the "use some technical terms to make it sound like I know what I'm talking about" school. E.g. Megan responds to a question about her TV set by saying "it's a Panasonic. HDMI" eh? And when someone is trying to repair the damage done by a hacker, they justify the time taken by saying that they have to go through each program, checking for viruses one line at a time. Couldn't she have got someone to read this for her and check for some semblance of authenticity?

The story was readable, but no great shakes. It's a couple of weeks since I finished it, and I can't really remember what happened. I wouldn't bother with any more by this author.

Completed : 15-Dec-2009 (audiobook)