All Around the Town

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Summary: Classic Mary Higgins Clark from first page to last.
Review: An intense journey into the dark world of child abuse and Multiple Personality Disorder, this book will grip your attention and not let go until the last page is finished. The story centers around a young woman who was kidnapped at the age of four and subjected to two years of sexual and mental abuse. When the child is returned to her family, her parents are unable to accept the possibility that their daughter was molested and fail to get the child counselling. A tragic incident after she's grown up catapults her fragile mind into shattered fragments. Her descent into madness leaves her vulnerable to the unholy schemes of stalkers. Only because of the heroic efforts of her attorney sister does she triumph over her personal demons, both imaginary and real. A must read!

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Summary: Another winning murder mystery....
Review: ALL AROUND THE TOWN by Mary Higgins Clark is a murder mystery involving two sisters. Laurie Kenyon is the younger sister, and her story starts with her kidnapping years ago when she was only 4 years old. She disappeared for 2 years, only to be found again, but never to be the same happy child she once was. Sarah Kenyon is her older sister. She watched as her family fell apart while her parents tried desperately to find their daughter. With this in mind, Sarah becomes Laurie's protector, and vows to always be there when Laurie needed her.

The story revolves around the two women, as a murder mystery unfolds where Laurie is the accused murderer. As the story progresses, Sarah, who is now an attorney, tries to save her sister. But the more Sarah learns, the worse it looks. Laurie is discovered to have multiple personalities, and could one of her personalities have been the murderer?

I've read many Mary Higgins Clark books, and this is probably one of her best. It left me on the edge of my seat and was so riveting that it took me only two days to read it. I highly recommend this book!

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Summary: An Eye Opening and Frightening Thriller
Review: Four-year-old Laurie Kenyon was a happy child, living a normal life with her loving parents and older sister. One day she sees a line of cars slowly driving by and, thinking it's a carnival, she goes outside to check and is taken. Two years later a cashier in a café happens to see her and a couple hours later she's left by the side of the road and returned to her family.

However her abductors have told her what will happen to her if she ever tells, and for a little girl who has spent the last two years trapped with cruel and perverse people who had been abusing her, that wasn't a warning to be taken lightly.

Fifteen years later Bic and Opal Hawkins, the couple that had abducted little Laurie, are televangelists, making a slick buck doing God's work. However, though they may have their evil eyes on heaven, they have them on Laurie too, who is now a senior in college.

Laurie is going through a tramatic period. Her parents have been killed in a bus crash. Her sister is overly protective. She's left her boyfriend and doesn't seem to know why. she's apparently obsessing over one of her professors and begins writing him erotic letters. Then the prof is murdered and Laure is suspect number one.

Did she do it? Can her lawyer sister help her? Two good questions and before they can be answered, it's discovered that Laurie is suffereing from MPD, multiple personality disorder. It seems there is more than one person in Lauire's head, a result of when she was living with the evil abuductors. When her abuse got so bad she couldn't stand it anymore, she'd hide in her head, go to a safe place. Is she still doing it? Did one of her personalities kill the prof without letting Laurie in on it?

Of course, the God fearing, child rapers are keeping an eye out to see if Laurie remembers and that's what really makes this book a thriller. However, I must admit, I had a hard time thinking about the child abuse. The book did, though, open my eyes to MPD. Over all, I'd have to say this was a story well worth reading.

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Summary: All Around the Town is an awesome book
Review: Mary Higgins Clark has done it once again! Her outstanding skills of writing suspense novels prevail in her novel, All Around the Town. All Around the Town is the story of a girl who is snatched from her home at the age of four and dropped off at a local school two years later. To deal with the trauma of this event, Laurie, the girl, makes up alter personalities. The personalities become nearly dormant until she blames herself for her parents death is a car accident. The personalities come out again to help her deal with the trauma of losing her parents. One of the personalities is then accused of killing one of Laurie's college professors, and none of the personalities remember killing him. The twists and turns in this story keep you reading it all night long. You just can't put it down. All Around the Town is a book to be read over and over again.

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Summary: You'll be glued to this book, and still you'll want more.
Review: If your're looking for fabulous mystery, I have the book for you, All Around the Town by Mary Higgings Clark.

There are two mysteries gong on in this book. Who kidanpped Laurie Kenyon, at the age of four? And years later when Laure is twenty~one and attending Clinton College, did she really did commit that awful crime of murdering her English poressor Allan Grant? Her sister Sarah, An attorney, takes up her defense. Sarah feels that it was her fault that her sister was kdnapped. After Laurie was returneced heome Sarah made this promise to God,"...I will always take care of her." With the help of psychaiatrist Justin Donnell, they will unlock the awful memmories of those two lost years. They find out that Laurie has developed multiple personalities. They work hard to help her over come this huge dilemma.

The characters in All Around the Town are so well developed that they could be people that you know. The setting helps make the book seem real,"...Ridgewood is one of the finest towns in New Jersey, it is in the upscaled price bracket...The properties are alive with flower trees in the spring. Dogwood. Cherry blossoms..." The writing style is easy to read and comprehend. There is good dialog between characters. Not so much that it gets boring, but just waht you need to know and to deep it interesting. You will ge guled to this book. You won't want to put it down to the last page, and even then you will still want to read more.

Not to worry, Marry Higgings Clark has several more mystery novels waitng for you at the library, and if they're all as thrilling as All Around the Town, you'll be in for months of exciting reading.

Marry Higgings Clark's All Around the Town is truly worth reading.

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Summary: Disturbing? Yes.
Review: All Around the Town is just perverted. Not scary, or creepy, just perverted. Plus you don't care much about any of the characters like you do in other MHC books. I couldn't bring myself to care about the girl with different personalities, or her sister, or that doctor with the mustache, or the perverted evangelists (although I guess that would defeat the purpose, eh?) Anyway...I didn't like this one. But maybe you will.

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Summary: Great job by Clark
Review: This was the first book of Clark's I ever read. It was very interesting and kept my attention. Laurie was kidnapped as a young girl but later found and returned to her family. Life seemed to go on until in college Laurie was accused of murdering her professor. Her sister, Sarah is an attorney and hires a shrink to help with the case. It is determined that Laurie has schizophrenia, a condition brought on by her experience with her 2 kidnappers. The story is very interesting and suspenseful. Laurie has no recollectoin of the murder, though her fingerprints are everywhere. There are lots of twists and turns with a surprise ending. I'd highly recommend this book.

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Summary: I was suprised!
Review: This book is amazing. I had never been intersested in Mary Higgins Clark, but my boyfriend bought this for me because he got her confused with Danielle Steel. I was kinda disappointed, but when I read the descripition, it sounded pretty good. For the first page I was hooked and could not put it down! I was pleasantly suprised by how interesting the story was. I love this book and would recomend it to anyone!

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Summary: first book i've read written by her
Review: This book is really great! After reading this book, I start to get more interested in multiple personalities. The story plot is well-written. I loved the part when Laurie is having her therapy, where her different personalities start to appear! This book is full of surprises and Mary Higgins Clark can describe it so well that it's as if you are in the story itself! I bet you would want to read her other books as well after reading this one, just like I do! THREE CHEERS TO THE QUEEN OF SUSPENSE!

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Summary: IT TOTALLY ROCKS!
Review: I think that Mary Higgins Clark did an awesome job on this story. And even though it is a little disturbing it was a great book and keeps you glued to the pages. If you love a mystery and love the suspense that goes with it than this book is totally what you want to read. For a little info on the book: one of the main characters (Laurie) was kidnapped at age 4 and returned two years but never fully recovered from the abduction. 17 years later she has been diagnosed with multiple personality disorder and is accused of murder, however Laurie has no memory of this but all the signs point to her. The kidnappers come back in her life and try to ruin it but Laurie's sister Sarah is helping her through the whole process and.... well I guess you just have to read it to figure out what happens hope you like it.