DARKNESS AND LIGHT - JOHN HARVEY
Publisher:
William Heinemann
ISBN: 0-434-01445-1
April 24 2006
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DARKNESS AND LIGHT -
John
Harvey
Following on from the incredibly successful Flesh And Blood and
Ash And Bone, Frank Elder returns for a third time in this, John
Harvey's latest novel, Darkness And Light, and immediately
poses the question: why didn't Frank stay where he was and save himself
the unrelenting drama of that which befalls him? That's not say we shouldn't
be grateful, because this is a truly wonderful novel written by a master
of his craft.
She wore a gold dress, short-sleeved, its skirt full-length and slightly
flared. He could see the faint indentation on her left hand, a pale
circle of skin giving away the fact that, until recently, a wedding
ring had been there. She looked peaceful, lying there on the bed, her
arms resting easily together, the left hand on the right, a slender
silver cross and chain encircling her neck, and not a wrinkle, not a
fold of her dress out of place. And, perhaps, she truly was at peace;
after all, she was dead. The sight that greeted Detective Inspector
Frank Elder on his first case with the Serious Crimes Unit was never
solved, no one was ever charged and the murderer never found; at liberty
to kill again. Eight years later, Elder's estranged wife contacts him
in his Cornish hideaway. Her friend's sister Claire - a quiet and withdrawn
widow in her fifties - has mysteriously disappeared. Elder, reluctantly,
agrees to dig around and see what he can find. Then Claire is found,
dead, arranged with meticulous detail on her bed, and it doesn't take
long for Elder to make the connection. It's obviously the work of the
same unbalanced individual and, to find the killer, Elder must shine
a light into the darkest recesses of human behaviour.
Written with great panache, Darkness
And Light crackles from first page to last with tension and
intrigue. The style in which the novel is written makes the reader immediately
comfortable with the characters and so lends a sense of natural empathy
with those playing out their roles. Elder, the reluctant expert haunted
by his past who merely wants to salvage enough to have a future, is
a masterpiece in as much as he is so real. The plot, the dialogue and
the atmosphere are all quite superb, whereas the setting, Nottingham,
lends a uniqueness to proceedings that is both refreshing and intriguing.
The character interactions are so believable it is as though as readers
we are being invited to listen in on private telephone conversations
as the more than credible storyline unfolds reach to a deeply sinister
and tantalising conclusion.
Darkness And Light is, quite simply, superb and should
be read by anybody who has even the slightest regard for fine writing.
For more John Harvey information,
log on to: http://www.mellotone.co.uk/
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