A literary thriller set in a crumbling luxury hotel in Egypt, in which an elderly widow and an 8- year-old boy find themselves rivals, locked in a gleefully criminal psychological game of cat-and-mouse.
Bollen gleefully lays on the melodrama and teases out the unmasking of his very unreliable narrator, escalating to a cymbal-crashing finale of revelations and violence.
Bollen also knows when to back off, allowing Maggie to show how truly dangerous she is and that maybe she’s not as good at her 'trade' as she professes to be. Bollen is, though, and how enjoyable it is to watch him work.
