WITH NO ONE AS WITNESS by ELIZABETH GEORGE

Three adolescent boys murdered in three different boroughs of London and no one thought it was a serial killer until  the first white victim was discovered. Unleashing a spate of public upheaval and media hype over the fact that if black boys were being killed, the cases were put on the back burner and it is only because a white boy has been killed that the Yard is taking some sort of interest  and the officious Inspector Hillier is coming to the fore.

Hillier instead of calming things down makes matters worse by putting Nkata as the face to the investigation purely because he is black, came from a gang and has now made Detective Sergeant. Hillier also comes up with the bright idea of having a journalist as part of the investigation and this leads to disastrous results.

The investigation seems to be going around in circles and it was only at the very end that I cottoned on to our murderer. There seemed to be so many suspects and then more than one murder was not connected to the earlier ones so that whether this was a serial killer, a copy cat killer or just a killer on the loose was not apparent.

I was taken aback by the amount of bureaucracy faced by Lynley, Havers and Nkata in just carrying out their duties. Back biting, currying favour seemed to be the order of the game and whether this is so or not I really don't know. It adds just another twist to the writing of Elizabeth George in whose books nothing is too small for minute detail. That sometimes there is overkill in the details is also apparent.

The stories themselves are very good and I do so like the descriptive parts very much. I like books that take me and plonk me down in the middle of London, Cornwall, the moors or wherever the book is set and Elizabeth George certainly does this. 

ANITA AND ME by MEERA SYAL

Meera is the daughter of a Punjabi couple who live in the village of Tollington. They seem to be the only  Asian in this village and source of great wonder for the inhabitants of the village. Meera because she has grown up in this village seems to be more part and parcel of the village, not an oddity but it is mainly due to the fact that like most immigrants, no one wants to stand out - they want to assimilate and get on with their lives in the quietest way possible. 

Like most children of immigrants Meera is torn in two. Does she go the way of the parents - respectful, traditional, listening above all to everything her parents tell her or does she go the independent way of her peers. The person whom Meera wants to most ape and befriend is the brassy Anita and she becomes Meera's "particular" friend and mentor. What Anita wants Anita gets and Meera follows her blindly until a rather gruesome end. The meaning of love and friendship, betrayal which at this age becomes so hard and finally bereavement hits Meera hard. 

The coming of age of Meera and Anita, the tough choices faced by families like Meera's parents trying to tread a path between tradition and the new ways (always hard - this my personal experience!!!), and at the same time to bring up your children in a "right way" is this story. It is in a way a coming of age story of the parents as well. 

I have watched several TV presentations of Meera Syal and thought the book was as light hearted as those shows. The book is certainly hilarious at times but overall it is a serious look at life.

MAILBOX MONDAY/IT'S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?

Nothing came into my Mailbox but I am hopeful it will come in tomorrow Tuesday! which is the US Monday!!!

This meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey. 

I read all the books I received last week and did reviews on three of them. There is only the Anita and Me by Meera Syal to go. I thought the book would deal with the differences between an Indian girl born in the UK and the contrast to her English friends but it was a little more than that. Review coming up. I am always amazed at how much change immigrants face and how they cope with the changes, trying to adapt, most importantly most of them trying to blend in and not be confrontational!

Presently reading an Elizabeth George 

Thomas Lynley at his suave best with Havers his sartorial opposite! I still cannot imagine an American author writing about the British, the countryside, the appalling ghettos in the UK - so descriptive, so much detail you are actually living in it. 

Next on my list is a triology of P D James - another brilliant mystery murder author. 

THE COLOUR by ROSE TREMAIN

I had read about the gold rush in California but the gold rush in New Zealand was a new story for me.    The reference to "colour" was also to gold which was also new to me. 

We have the story of emigration and the tough life faced by all immigrants whether this took place in the 19th century or in present times. All immigrants face a period of settling in and in the rough, underpopulated areas of remote New Zealand, life was even tougher than usual. Harriet being one woman and a respectably, married one at that sets her apart from the floozies and boarding house mistresses who are the only women around. 

The story is also of a marriage and its ultimate breakdown with glimpses into how people of two different temperaments who are not willing to communicate and who are really not willing to be totally free with each other, can lead to a total breakdown of the relationship. 

The story is built up slowly - almost block by block. We have Harriet and Joseph and his mother Lilian coming to New Zealand with great hopes on the part of Harriet and Joseph but with a secret desire not to be part of her son's schemes on the part of Lilian who longs for the respectability and routine of what she knows. How Joseph is ensnared by the magnetic pull of gold and how he is constantly reminded of the crime he committed which forced him to leave England and Harriet in her turn thought that marriage was the only way to escape her being a permanent governess and that she looked forward to her marriage as a new beginning in her life. The failure of the marriage and the awareness of the failure by both Joseph and Harriet who kept their minds secret  from each other are all part of this story.

Add to this a bit of homosexuality,  Maori folk lore, descriptive countryside both bleak and luxuriant (depending on the weather!) and a good storyline and you have a very readable book. 

PLAYING FOR THE ASHES by ELIZABETH GEORGE

Before I like the story I just love our plummy Lynley and his diamond in the rough Havers. I do so like to see how the two work so amicably together and how they each understand how the other's mind evolves despite one being such a toff and the other from such a homespun background. It adds so much to the conversation and the sparkle the differences between these two that it is now part of the book.

We have a death by fire in a cottage in Kent of a famous cricketeer who was going to play for the English national team. We have infidelity and adultery in spades, we have a possessive, bitter wife and children who now realize that for their father, they are a poor second and then we have the much older woman - definitely a mother figure who does not seem to have very motherly feelings for her protegee. We also have estranged daughters and life threatening illnesses.

Put the lot together and we have a brilliant murder, very well executed and which kept me guessing as to the real murderer till about 50 pages to the end. This in a book which was more than 620 pages so it did keep me going. 

Story telling at its best, Elizabeth George's ability to take words and make magic with them is enthralling. Anyone who likes murder, mystery, along with a British stiff upper lip type of theme would love her work.  

After my grousing over the weather, we are having rain. We never do anything by halves. We now have flooding in several suburbs and 5000 homeless according to our local paper in the Gampaha district. 

MAILBOX MONDAY/IT'S MONDAY! WHAT ARE YOU READING?

Coming to this meme after a bit of an absence. The host for this month is 4 the LOVE of BOOKS

The few books which came into my home were 

The Novel in the Viola which I read and reviewed. I just loved this book. Despite its overtones of sadness!!!

My enthusiasm for this author does not wane.  Human relationships at its best.

Meera Syal's debut novel. Immigrant stories fascinate me. Maybe because my three children are immigrants in Australia! the adjustments are many and varied and fascinating.

The immigrant theme continues but take it back a century. Another author whom I like.

The meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

I finished 

Twisted family relationships - bitter and possessive. Possessive to the point of never ever letting go. Love that can be so blind is it love I wonder. Marvellous read, review coming.

I only realised today that Elizabeth George is American. She writes books set in England with such descriptive detail that I had to actually go and double check that this was so!

THE RECTOR'S WIFE by JOANNA TROLLOPE

From the opening pages you do know that this idyllic state of affairs cannot last. We have Anna patient and long suffering - 20 years of service to church and family, putting herself right at the very end of a long list of can and can't dos. A life governed not by the dictates of the needs of husband and family but  by the dictatorial attitudes of a village community who decide in advance what clergy and their wives should and should not do.

I was cheering Anna from the beginning to the end and even though the end of her husband was a bit deflating I still felt vindicated for her at the end!  Flora her youngest was a whinger, Luke the next tried hard to understand his mother's plight and he did to a great extent, Charlotte the eldest also understood but none of them knew how to communicate their support to her. Peter her husband was completely out of the equation. He did not understand Anna nor did he want to. He seemed to have blind tunnel vision as to what was needed in a bad situation. Anna is almost pushed into another man's arms by her husband himself though he would be the last person to even admit this.

I felt that this was a very good example of keeping a stiff upper lip, of maintaining space and not infringing into someone else's lives for fear of interfering and the lack of communication within a family. The break up of a marriage can be seen from the very beginning and I was not sad to see it go. For Anna it was going to be a beginning for herself.

As usual I like Trollope's books very much. This was no exception.