To Be Released October 15th 2013!
Title: Just One Evil Act
Author: Elizabeth George
Publisher: Dutton
Genre: Crime Fiction
Length: 723 pages
Elizabeth George has the uncanny ability to spend pages detailing the aura of even the most minor characters. I admire this ability to dive into hefty and lengthy character developments, no character too small for complete notice (“A persons a person no matter how small” if I may quote Dr. Suess!). It reminds me of when I read Karleen Koen, different genre, same attention to characters, same knack for writing tomes.
I was pretty excited that Dutton chose to send me a second Elizabeth George book. They sent me Believing the Lie before it was released, and now I’ve been gifted a chance to read and review Just One Evil Act prior to its being available in stores. Naturally, I procrastinated and didn’t start reading it until the other day. Good thing Inspector Lynley and Detective Barbara Havers are quick to digest.
The book will be on shelves everywhere tomorrow, October 15th. It’s a good one to read if you’ve never read an Inspector Lynley novel before because George goes outside her comfort zone and finally leaves the UK. So it’s new and different whether you’re new to George, or have been following her stories for years.
How to Buy a Love of Reading… Just buy Gibson’s book
Title: How to Buy a Love of Reading
Author: Tanya Egan Gibson
Publisher: Dutton, a member of Penguin group
Genre: Fiction
Length: 389 pages
I cannot begin to count, honestly, the number of times I was brought to tears by this book. Something that was supposed to be light and fun proved to be something beautiful and amazing, something that moved me more than words can express.
I cannot begin to count, honestly, the number I times I fell in love with Hunter. Over and over again, reminding me of boys I fell in love with in real life. Stranger still, reminding me of myself.
I found Carly amazing, and brave, and beautiful, a character who reminded me of people I both love and hate.
I found Gibson reminding me why I fell in love with Fitzgerald in high school and how I cherish every blessed word of Gatsby and every word written about it.
I found myself wanting to share this jewel with a dear friend who has already left this world and lonely because of all the disappointment in his missing it.
I sit here writing the most incoherent review in the immediate moment of completion because I’m blown away, dazed, and I don’t want it to end, even though the ending is so perfectly final.
Believing the Lie – A Review
Title: Believing the Lie
Author: Elizabeth George
Publisher: Dutton, a member of Penguin group
Genre: mystery
Length: 610 pages
Dutton Books, to my surprise and excitement, kindly provided me with a copy of Believing the Lie, Inspector Lynley’s 17th book appearance, just weeks before its official release date. Despite this book being number seventeen in a series, and having never read any of George’s previous work, I often wondered which characters were reoccurring ones and which were unique to this title. The work and the character development was so seamless, this was unclear until nearly toward the end.
“[…] Darling, secrets and silence caused all of this. Lies caused this,” Inspector Lynley summarizes the novel of which he is supposedly the star. It is refreshing to read a crime writer who gives you such a large cast of characters in such detail, its surprising to find that the lead inspector is more like the wood frame that holds a canvas together than the paint that creates the work of art itself. He is ever in the middle of the action, but rarely the focus, he merely serves as the reason for the story’s existence in the first place.
George writes human tension beautifully. More than a typical mystery, George has written a well crafted drama involving social issues surrounding homosexuals, transsexuals, and the families who love but fail to understand them. During all this family drama, international culture issues, marital affairs, and even a child pornography ring, the biggest truth to be revealed of this murder mystery, is whether there has even been a murder at all.
Typically, when I read mysteries I take the cozy, less than 200 page ones for what I call “bubble bath books,” something I can read in one sitting in the tub. As much as I love those (my cotton candy for the soul), I say with the highest compliment intended, George does not write bubble bath mysteries. And quite different from those sorts of books, this one left me wondering: What Next?
Anakalian Whims 