Curfew, (Paperback)

In the near future in Britain, the world looks different. After a terrible murder committed by a man, there were some big changes made. Men are now electronically tagged to prevent them from breaking the 7 p.m. curfew. Equality has finally come for women and things are looking up. Sarah is raising her rebellious daughter, Cass on her own since her husband was sent to prison for violating the curfew. She has gotten a job as a tagger and moved them into a female only apartment complex. Cass dislikes the rules for men and makes her views known. Her best friend is Billy, and she knows that he would never hurt anyone. Cass wants to find a way to prove that the tagging system is wrong. Helen is a teacher at a local school who longs for a baby. She is dating a man whom her best friend does not like, but Helen has applied for them to live together. A body is found in the local park. One of these women was murdered during the night, and the evidence suggests that she knew her killer. Officers at the scene wonder how a woman could do such a thing, but one detective believes a man did the deed. The detective, though, will need to find a way to break his alibi—his electronic tag. Curfew by Jayne Cowie has a unique concept with a female dominated society where men are tagged and have a curfew. The story is told through alternating points-of-view (Sarah, Cass, Helen, Pamela, and Mabel). Pamela, a detective, has her story told in the first person. After the body is found in the beginning of Curfew, the story goes back four weeks. We are introduced to each character and get their backstory. The characters came across caricatures instead of a realistic people. This is especially true of Cass who is seventeen and knows everything (sometimes her behavior seemed more appropriate for someone fourteen). Cass's character was over-the-top and exaggerated. I wanted well-rounded, realistic characters. Only one character grew or developed by the end of the story, but the growth was not all positive. Most of the women view men as not to be trusted. There are no likeable male characters in the story. The murder is very simple and can easily be solved long before the reveal. The book started out strong with the murder, but I soon found myself bored. I found Curfew to be predictable and the viewpoint too skewed. The man-hating became tiresome after a couple of chapters. Curfew does contain foul language, violence, and intimate situations. By the end of Curfew, I had to wonder if the writer liked men at all. Curfew had a good blurb, but it ended up being a dud.