One would think that a book whose main character is a contract assassin would be fast-moving and violent, but instead this book takes its time. Hornclaw, an unassuming woman in her sixties, uses her age as a visual shield: no one suspects the grandma. Yet her shield of uncaring and unattachment, built over decades, begins to crack just as a very personal threat looms. I thought the pacing of the plot was a little uneven – seemed like over half the book was taken up in a detailed portrait of Hornclaw’s circumstances before all the plot points started to rain hurriedly in – but I liked the flow of the prose and the social commentary on the role of the elderly.