Felix Brewer is a successful bookmaker until he's convicted by the Feds. Unable to face imprisonment, he leaves his wife, three daughters and a mistress behind.
When his girlfriend, Julie Saxony, disappears ten years later, it's widely assumed that she's left town to join him.
When her decomposed body is found in a local park, it's obvious that she hasn't left to join her lover. The police work the case, but are unable to close it.
A retired detective, bereft by the loss of his wife to cancer, goes to work as an independent contractor for Baltimore's police department, working cold cases. He chooses his own hours and chooses his own cases.
One day he opens the Julie Saxony file, and the picture he sees there, of a beautiful blonde woman with breatakingly beautiful blue eyes, makes him choose her for his next cold case investigation.
I really enjoyed this book. It was certainly suspenseful - it's a murder mystery, after all - but what was really interesting about this novel was Lippman's exploration of the lives, burdens and conflicts of the wife, daughters and mistress left behind.
Her characters are well delineated and they behave in unpredictable ways that seem fresh and original,
This is the rare suspense novel with fully developed characters struggling with real lives. This is not a Tess Monaghan novel, but she makes an appearance at the end of the story.
I talked to a friend of mine about whether or not this novel was enjoyed by her mystery book group. She said the folks in her mystery book group liked the novel well enough, but that they thought it was not a mystery. I said, "How can they say that? There's a body and there's a detective." She said, "Well, they said that what the novel was really about was the lives of the women left behind." That's true: that is what this novel is really about. It is a very suspenseful novel, however, and I think many mystery readers will still enjoy it,
When his girlfriend, Julie Saxony, disappears ten years later, it's widely assumed that she's left town to join him.
When her decomposed body is found in a local park, it's obvious that she hasn't left to join her lover. The police work the case, but are unable to close it.
A retired detective, bereft by the loss of his wife to cancer, goes to work as an independent contractor for Baltimore's police department, working cold cases. He chooses his own hours and chooses his own cases.
One day he opens the Julie Saxony file, and the picture he sees there, of a beautiful blonde woman with breatakingly beautiful blue eyes, makes him choose her for his next cold case investigation.
I really enjoyed this book. It was certainly suspenseful - it's a murder mystery, after all - but what was really interesting about this novel was Lippman's exploration of the lives, burdens and conflicts of the wife, daughters and mistress left behind.
Her characters are well delineated and they behave in unpredictable ways that seem fresh and original,
This is the rare suspense novel with fully developed characters struggling with real lives. This is not a Tess Monaghan novel, but she makes an appearance at the end of the story.
I talked to a friend of mine about whether or not this novel was enjoyed by her mystery book group. She said the folks in her mystery book group liked the novel well enough, but that they thought it was not a mystery. I said, "How can they say that? There's a body and there's a detective." She said, "Well, they said that what the novel was really about was the lives of the women left behind." That's true: that is what this novel is really about. It is a very suspenseful novel, however, and I think many mystery readers will still enjoy it,
No comments:
Post a Comment