A Traitor to Memory

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing Addition to a Great Series
Review: A hit-and-run driver kills Eugenie Davies on a rainy night in London. Superintendent Webberly has a special interest in the victim and assigns Detective Lynley and Constable Havers to the case. Their investigation of Eugenie's trauma filled past turns up a wealth of suspects. Meanwhile, Gideon, violin genius extraordinaire, is struggling to overcome his sudden inability to play by revisiting his childhood memories with a therapist. Gideon's story and the murder investigation are woven together into an explosive collision course.

I'm a fan of George's Lynley/Havers mysteries, so it pains me to say that this one really needed some editing. At over 1000 rambling pages, it's a long slog to get to an uncharacteristically disjointed ending. George does paint a fascinating portrait of a severely dysfunctional family, but that doesn't make up for unexplained motivations and weak plot elements. One of George's strengths has been getting readers involved in the personal lives of her detectives as well as getting drawn into the mystery at hand. Unfortunately, Lynley, Havers, and the rest of the usual inhabitants feel more like supporting characters in A Traitor to Memory.

Ultimately, I found this book hard to get into and difficult to finish. If you're new to Elizabeth George, you might want to start with A Great Deliverance or Payment in Blood.

Rating:
Summary: Where Are the Heroes?
Review: Fans of mystery writer Elizabeth George are likely to be a little disappointed in the latest installment of the Lynley-Havers series. For starters, there is very little of either Thomas Lynley or Barbara Havers in the book, they are more or less supporting players in the drama which centers around one of the more dysfunctional families in recent literature.

The tragic tale of the Davies family, told in flashback/diary format, is ultimately gripping and very well written - but it is intercut with a real-time crime-solving narrative that is confusing, cluttered with unecessary plot elements, and ambiguous.

This long book, in need of much sharper editing, is nonetheless a must read for Lynley-Havers addicts who wouldn't want to miss even the smallest tidbit of character development, but it is not likely to attract and hold many new readers.

Okay - so this wasn't the best of the bunch - I'm still a fan, I still care about the characters, and I will wait not too patiently for the next, hopefully better, installment.

Rating:
Summary: Still great!
Review: I am a great fan of Elizabeth George and have found all of her books engrossing. Of them all, however, this one is definitely the weakest. For the first time, I guessed fairly early on who the real culprit was.

All of Ms. George's books have truly dysfunctional, if not downright crazy, characters in them (in addition to the perpetrator), but she always creates a balance with her continuing characters of Lynley, Helen, Deborah, St. James and Havers - normal, flawed people getting on with their lives. Without the continuing characters, the hopelessness of the rest of the characters would make this book too depressing.

All in all, it was a great read and I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: TOOO LONG !!!
Review: I went on vacation this summer to my mother's house in Florida. She had gotten two new books for me to read--"A Traitor to Memory" and P.D. James latest. I started reading Elizabeth George because she is one of my favorite writers and I usually thoroughly enjoy her books. However, this book was way too long!! The same plot, characters and all the ramifications could have been told in 500 pages and been a much better book. I guess what I don't understand is why the publishers, her editor, etc. don't/can't tell an author that they have "diarrhea" of the pen and the book will suffer for it. Because this one did--it's way too long. By the time I was finished I really didn't care who had done what--I was thoroughly bored with the whole thing and just wanted it to end. Please somebody, tell Ms. George to tell the story faster next time. I'm sorry to say that I really did not enjoy this book and hope that her next book is better.

Rating:
Summary: The 1,024 page souffle
Review: That sounds like an oxymoron, I know, but it's the truth. You wonder how a book this laboriously dense can ultimately amount to so little. I have yet to read the latest George novel, and having read them in order (it was a REAL struggle to continue after "A SUITABLE VENGEANCE" and "MISSING JOSEPH") -- and after the near-contemptuous description of Australians in "I, RICHARD" -- not to mention the stunningly predictable "surprise" endings, I don't know wheter I'll persevere. If this is a trend, well -- there are bettter things to read, really.

I read the British edition of this book, and it should have tipped me off just reading the blurb -- the fact that it gave a lead-in to the Gideon sections of the book, and then the Lynley/Havers section, and neither seemed (from the way the blurb was phrased) remotely related; just, apparently, two separate books in one volume. And in many respects, it is. (And that introductory passage that really never gets chased up -- there's another tip-off.)

I will say this now: if the first two or so Gideon entries don't hold your interest, you really shouldn't bother reading the rest, since the other sections of the book tended to recap the journal entries a lot -- and (fortunately) in a far less whining, irritating manner.

The rest of the book was more like a typical George novel -- endless subplots, the usual quota of hard-core porn (with lesbians this time; ooh-er!), the stilted British dialogue (as I just included), a mocking of Havers which is really going into overkill now -- she dresses dowdy! Stop beating us over the head with it! -- more pregancy-related woes . . . although I should point out that as for subplots, Havers' possibly burgeoning relationship with her Pakistani neighbor (whose name I can't remember right now) isn't really continued, unlike the previous novel ("IN PURSUIT OF THE PROPER SINNER"). At least that was a storyline vaguely comprehendible. And might I add that the whole British spelling thing is wearing a little thin -- if it's supposed to add to the flavor of the text, as George says it should, why can't the text -- the descriptions of settings -- the characters -- do so alone?

So, the novel could have been about half its present length -- or less, if the Gideon sections had been reduced, or just taken out altogether.

But above all, if the plot didn't have to be so long -- and such an effort to drag yourself through -- it could have been more cohesive. If the book is a mystery, it's supposed to reach a satisfactory ending -- which is, as it stands, the real traitor of the book.

(Oh, and a final note -- the glowing reviews on the covers of George's books constantly draw [unfair, IMO] comparison to P.D. James and Ruth Rendell. Has anyone ever noticed how _their_ detective novels are only 200-300 pages long? But George's . . .)

Rating:
Summary: An Usatisfactory Ending
Review: The ending of the book was most unsatisfying for me. Libby didn't behave as her character did throughout the book. Gideon doesn't get his question answered, unless holding Libby down by the shoulders as he'd done his sister long ago is his answer? What happens to Webberly and his wife? What happens to Richard? What happens to Wolf? For such a complicated book I was very surprised at its ending. Elizabeth George is such an excellent writer I wonder why she allowed this to be? I would not recommed this book to a new reader of George, but one reviewer was a first time reader and liked it a lot; go figure?