Rating: 
Summary: Significant improvement over 1st book
Review: And the first novel in this series was pretty dang good. The only thing that gave me fits was that there were so many characters that until one was introduced at length, I couldn't get a good fix on his or her place in the story. But I was pleased with the plotting as well as the development of the main characters.
Rating: 
Summary: Really good
Review: Even though George paints a somewhat old-fashioned portrait of English life, she is still able to write very very good mysteries. Her detecive thrillers are clever, intuitive, have nice twists, good, well evoked settings, and are very well written, if somewhat OVER written. the mystery here is first class as ever. she writes with the style of agatha christie, and comes up with solutions that the dead queen would be proud of. It is only a shame that Lynley is not quite as interesting as Poirot. However, the relationships the main characters 5 characters really are VERY interesting. they add weight, credibility, and realism to the story. they add a more personal and intimate side, and prove an ongoing drama to mix with that of the different crimes which come up in each book. She is very good at drawing her character, and very good at coming up with agatha christie style plots. her psychology is accurate, and her writing very descriptive. Definitely worth a read. This second book was very very good. So far, i dont think she written a bad one, and i've read nearly all of them. A good build up A Great Deliverance, and got the series off to a really smashing start.
Rating:
Summary: What a Team - Havers and Lynley
Review: Havers and Lynley are the best Detective Team out there as far as I'm concerned. They are so opposite, but they work. It's nice to see that Havers takes charge a bit in this book. This is a fine example of an English "cozy", and I liked the tight plot and the story was good too. Ms. George usually has two or three main storylines going at once, and this book is no exception with two, and she has a talent for fully developing both as she gets through her story. She's an excellent writer, and I really enjoy this series. I can't wait to read another to see how the relationship between Havers and Lynley develops. I hope to see more of the talented Miss Havers in the next books.
Rating:
Summary: Another fine addition to the mystery genre
Review: I enjoy the Lynley/Havers series very much and found this book very hard to put down. The central mystery involves the death of a Playwright on a Scottish estate and the cast of suspects that were involved. The story moves from the estate to various other locations which keeps the reader interested. There were some problems that I had with the story. There were too many characters and sub-plots involved that took away from the main mystery- including the romantic turmoil of Lynley and some past crimes. There was also a conspiracy plot thrown which only took away from the main mystery. I did like the character development and I did feel for Lynley and Havers at various times during the novel. This is still a good mystery to add to your collection and I will continue to follow this series.
Rating:
Summary: Another fine addition to the mystery genre
Review: I enjoy the Lynley/Havers series very much and found this book very hard to put down. The central mystery involves the death of a Playwright on a Scottish estate and the cast of suspects that were involved. The story moves from the estate to various other locations which keeps the reader interested. There were some problems that I had with the story. There were too many characters and sub-plots involved that took away from the main mystery- including the romantic turmoil of Lynley and some past crimes. There was also a conspiracy plot thrown which only took away from the main mystery. I did like the character development and I did feel for Lynley and Havers at various times during the novel. This is still a good mystery to add to your collection and I will continue to follow this series.
Rating:
Summary: Theatre, mystery, and love...what more can you ask for
Review: Payment in Blood is one of my favorite Elizabeth George mysteries -- primarily because it involves the theatre world and as someone who has worked in the theatre, I enjoyed seeing her treatment of actors and directors (quite accurate in some areas). Lady Helen Clyde, with whom Lynley was somewhat in love with, is dating a member of a new theatrical production which complicates the relationship between the two. How can he proceed it this case when the result may mean breaking Lady Helen's heart?
Rating: 
Summary: A Bit More Puzzling
Review: The mystery in this book was a bit more complex than that in George's first book in this series: the solution was not as apparent. Unfortunately, there were so many secondary characters that it was hard to keep them straight. It was obvious that these characters were there to act as "red herrings". I also thought that the coincidence of Lady Helen being on the scene of a murder, and intimately involved, was a bit of a stretch, but was able to accept it with just a grain of salt. George did a fairly good job of giving us more insight into the main characters (Lynley, Havers, Helen, and Deborah) and fleshed out their backgrounds quite well. I thought that the last third of the book was far too dragged out...I found myself skimming a lot.
Rating:
Summary: A Bit More Puzzling
Review: The mystery in this book was a bit more complex than that in George's first book in this series: the solution was not as apparent. Unfortunately, there were so many secondary characters that it was hard to keep them straight. It was obvious that these characters were there to act as "red herrings". I also thought that the coincidence of Lady Helen being on the scene of a murder, and intimately involved, was a bit of a stretch, but was able to accept it with just a grain of salt. George did a fairly good job of giving us more insight into the main characters (Lynley, Havers, Helen, and Deborah) and fleshed out their backgrounds quite well. I thought that the last third of the book was far too dragged out...I found myself skimming a lot.
Rating:
Summary: Second Installment in Lynley-Havers Series is Solid
Review: The second installment in Elizabeth George's successful Lynley-Havers mystery series is a solid successor to the first book, A Great Deliverance. In this story, the melding of the cozy, police procedural, and hard-boiled genres that was balanced so well in the first book leans a little more to the cozy side of things, with a trip to Scotland to investigate a murder on an ancient Scottish estate (turned up-scale bed and breakfast), which evolves into a classic locked-room mystery with a cast of illustrious and spoiled suspects. The emphasis is a bit more on Lynley than Havers in this story, which is expected since he promotes more of the cozy feel, while Havers promotes more of the hard-boiled feel. However, Havers fans should not despair -- her dark side is still there, althouth a bit tempered. All in all, this mystery advances the ongoing tale of these two seemingly ill-matched yet complementary partners, by exploring Lynley's "dark side", fleshing him out a bit more than in the first book.
Rating:
Summary: The mysteries of the human heart
Review: This novel is an interesting mixture of a big-country-house mystery in the tradition of Agatha Christie and a much deeper study of the way that humans can fundamentally hurt and deceive themselves. I really loved A Suitable Vengeance, the first novel in this series. This one took me a little longer to get into, but I found it equally interesting and compelling, once it got started. Thomas Lynley has to confront his feelings for Lady Helen Clyde, whose lover may (or may not) be implicated in a murder. Lynley is, at first, remarkably blind to his own feelings, and then lets jealously completely overtake himself and his judgement. He also is blind to the ways that Scotland Yard CID is manipulating him, taking advantage of his class assumptions and loyalties. Barabara Havers, with her own set of class assumptions and much more stunted interpersonal relations, has to confront her loyalties to Lynley and to her career, and is the character who probably grows the most in this book. There are quite a few "red herrings" here, from a traditional mystery perspective. I am usually les interested in figuring out mystery stories than I am in the character development along the way, but I will say that I figured out the villain in this one!
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