The Abortionist's Daughter [Hardcover]

Elisabeth Hyde (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 20, 2006

Elisabeth Hyde has taken a powerful moral predicament and constructed around it a richly layered, compulsively readable novel about a murder in a small Colorado town, about the choices we make and the way their unintended consequences ripple through our lives.

Two weeks before Christmas, Diana Duprey, an outspoken abortion doctor, is found floating in her pool, a bruise the size of a golf ball visible through her dark curls. A national figure, Diana inspired passion and ignited tempers, never more so than on the day of her death.

Her husband, Frank, an attorney in the D.A.’s office for more than twenty years, had fought bitterly with her on the day of her murder. Yet to reveal the nature of their fight would cost him not only his career but something greater still—a relationship he will go to any lengths to protect. Diana’s daughter, Megan, a college freshman, had also quarreled with Diana that day, and her role in her mother’s murder will prove more significant than she ever could have anticipated. The Reverend Stephen O’Connell, founder of the town’s pro-life coalition, obviously had issues with Diana, but his anger extended beyond the political to the personal—namely, Dr. Duprey’s involvement with his own troubled teenager. Meanwhile, the detective on the case grapples to make sense of it all. His investigation implicates many in this town and reveals a series of gross miscalculations, each one challenging what we know, or think we know, about community, fidelity, justice, and love.

A riveting and provocative page-turner: a novel of stunning economy and momentum by a writer poised for wide discovery.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Dr. Diana Duprey—abortion clinic director, wife of local Colorado DA Frank Thompson and mother of 19-year-old college freshman Megan—has plenty of enemies, so when her body is found floating in the exercise pool of her garden tour–featured house, the list of suspects is long. Aside from abortion opponents and distraught parents, there were the arguments overheard between Frank and Diana, and Megan and Diana shortly before. The coroner, a woman with whom Frank had had an affair, won't do the autopsy, and a man harboring a grudge against Frank takes her place. Meanwhile, Megan finds herself attracted to Huck Berlin, the policeman assigned to the case, and Huck finds Megan in various compromising positions. Former U.S. attorney Hyde (Crazy as Chocolate) describes Megan's contradictory, confused emotions without oversimplification ("Have fun killing babies" were Megan's inadvertent last words to her mother). Hyde also jumps back in time, delving into Diana's work at the clinic and her feelings about it, as well as the lives and feelings of her clients. Rather than generating suspense, the murder provides a frame for the turbulence in and around a woman propelled by idealism and strongly held beliefs. Look for this book to get play as South Dakota's challenge to Roe v. Wade wends through the courts. 150,000 announced first printing.(June 23)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Elisabeth Hyde, a former U.S. attorney, delicately handles the complex legalities of abortion as well as the physical details of the act. While most reviewers felt Hyde sets up a strong, occasionally page-turning murder story, some were put off by the number of pages on the graphic details of abortion. Most reviewers also agreed that the question of whodunit here is relatively inconsequential, especially considering the mounting doubts. What saves the story and makes it recommendable is the painfully accurate portrait of the title character's agonizing end to adolescence.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; 1ST edition (June 20, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0307263665
• ISBN-13: 978-0307263667
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (51 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,431,126 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I grew up in Concord, NH, the third of 4 daughters. After majoring in English at the University of Vermont, I went on to law school, at Hastings College of the Law, in San Francisco. During law school, the only novel I read was Mary Gordon's Final Payments. Then, after I'd just taken the bar exam, someone handed me a copy of The World According to Garp, and I was lucky to go back to Vermont for the Bread Loaf Writer's Conference, where I studied with John Irving and the late John Gardner. I did practice law, but only for 2 1/2 years, in Washington, DC, with the Justice Department. It was in Seattle that I wrote my first novel, Her Native Colors (Delacorte); after that I got married, had my first child, wrote Monoosook Valley (Delta), moved to Boulder, had twin girls, wrote Crazy As Chocolate (MacAdam/Cage), went to a lot of soccer games, and wrote The Abortionist's Daughter. I'm currently working on a novel about a river trip in the Grand Canyon, which will be published by Knopf.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Compelling but ultimately distancing novel, July 10, 2006

By 

Chick with Book - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Abortionist's Daughter (Hardcover)

The title of THE ABORTIONIST'S DAUGHTER suggests that the novel will center on Megan, a Colorado college student who comes from a local prominent family. Not only does her mother run the local abortion clinic, but her father is on the DA's staff. But for all their upper middle class affluence (they even have a lap pool with a motor-generated current against which to swim), the family is touched by tragedy. Megan's younger brother Ben, born with Down's Syndrome, died ten years ago at the age of four.

But while Megan does play an important role, the novel is far from just her story. On a December evening, a few weeks before Christmas, Dr. Diana Duprey is found dead in her lap pool. She has a direct line to the police department because so many threats have been made against her, but she also puts her house on an annual home design tour. Therefore, the people who had access to case her house are unlimited in number. She was seen in the company of a local religious right leader, against whom she has a restraining order, earlier that day. Her neighbor heard her engage in a screaming match with her husband, Frank, that afternoon. The local coroner takes herself off the case because she had an affair, years ago, with Frank. So just who did kill the abortionist?

While the murder mystery provides the framework for the story, the novel is much more than a whodunit. It flashes backwards as needed, slowly providing the clues needed to recreate Diana's last day, the events leading up to her murder, and the effect it has had not only on her daughter and husband, but the greater community as a whole. The slow unpeeling of the layers makes for compelling reading, and the revelations are well-paced.

However, this is a not a character study. While there are some beautifully drawn characters in the novel, the writer's use of omniscient POV keeps the reader at a distance and we never get to know the characters intimately. Therefore, the impact of Diana's death, while acknowledged, is not really felt. Diana herself is the novel's most intriguing and vivid character, and one almost wishes that the author had discarded the mystery and focused on the living Diana, her conflicts and ambiguities. Here is a woman who provides abortions (reset buttons, she calls them) yet chooses to keep her Down's Syndrome baby, only to lose him at the age of four. She is far more interesting than Megan, who is your average mixed-up teenager rebelling against her parents and upbringing.

Still, THE ABORTIONIST'S DAUGHTER is a beautifully written book that keeps the reader turning pages.

19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A thoroughly engrossing novel on topics ranging from family relations to parent-child relations to love affairs to true crime, June 20, 2006

By 

Jessica Lux (Rosamond, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Abortionist's Daughter (Hardcover)

At its core, The Abortionist's Daughter is a mystery novel, but I wouldn't dare cheapen it by assigning a genre label. This is modern literary fiction at its best, with reflections on a marriage between two high-profile professionals, on the trials of raising a special needs child, on raising a teenaged daughter, and, of course, on the ethics of abortion.

The plot centers on the bludgeoning death of famed abortion doctor Diane Duprey. An outspoken activist, Duprey had garnered plenty of attention and a few public enemies in her two-decade career. She had a laundry list of restraining orders. On the other hand, her husband, the district attorney, had a violent temper, and the neighbors have heard their glass-shattering fights over the years. All of this leaves Dr, Duprey's college-age daughter, Megan, with a host of unanswered questions, including suspicions about her own father's whereabouts on the night of her mother's murder. Megan also has her own personal and romantic life to deal with, in addition to the complete upheaval of her family situation.

Author Elizabeth Hyde delivers a subtle twist in the murder of Diane Duprey, but it is only one of a half-dozen low-key (and entirely plausible) twists in the lives of this small Northeastern town. The outspoken pro-choice Reverend has several of his own skeletons in the closet, Dr. Duprey had recently violated her own retraining order to have conversations with the Reverend, Dr. Duprey's husband refuses to disclose his activities in the hours preceding his wife's death, there is a scandalous affair in the past history of the husband and wife, a cop is accused of questionable behavior with a witness, and daughter Megan has used questionable judgement in dealing with an ex-boyfriend.

This is a thoroughly engrossing novel that addresses a spectrum of topics from family relations to parent-child relations to love affairs to true crime. While the slant of the book is decidedly favorable to a pro-choice viewpoint, the anti-choice perspective is also portrayed in an objective and thought-provoking manner. Fans of this book may enjoy the movie Vera Drake, which is similarly philosophical on the topic of abortion.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars (2.5 stars) It felt like there was something missing..., September 13, 2006

By 

Cassie W. (Ohio) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Abortionist's Daughter (Hardcover)

Dr. Diana Duprey is infamous in the small Colorado town she calls home. Not because of her husband, Frank, who's a Colorado District Attorney, or because of her beautiful home, which has been in the Home Show for the last three years. No, Dr. Duprey is well-known because of her profession: She runs the only abortion clinic in town. So when she's found floating dead in her pool, an ugly bruise discoloring her forehead, the list of murder suspects is not a short one.

For detective Huck Berlin, everyone is a suspect: the religious zealots who camp outside the clinic every day with their disturbing signs and leave hateful messages on Diana's answering machine, the reverend in charge of the local Coalition for Life, the coroner who had an affair with Frank years earlier...Even Diana's husband and daughter, nineteen-year-old Megan, who both quarreled with her on the day of her death, are being closely watched. The investigation gets even more complicated when Frank won't provide a motive for his whereabouts at the time of Diana's death, and Huck begins to fall for Megan against his better judgement.

I'm completely in the minority here, but I just didn't like THE ABORTIONIST'S DAUGHTER as much as most of the other reviewers. It just felt like there was something missing. All of the characters lack depth--with the exception of Diana herself, who we meet only in flashbacks--and they just aren't compelling or likeable. I couldn't wait to read this novel, because it seemed like there was so much potential for a sensitive discussion about some controversial issues (abortion, infidelity, contemporary marriage, recreational drug use, obsession, etc.). Unfortunately, while Hyde touches on all of these issues, she doesn't go in depth enough to make any kind of worthwhile statement about them. The plot itself seems empty--there's just not a lot of meat to the story. The murderer is obvious pretty much right away, and the relationship between Megan and Huck feels completely inauthentic. Megan herself comes across as an immature, spoiled brat, and she didn't gain my sympathy at ALL.

The last two chapters of THE ABORTIONIST'S DAUGHTER are just stellar (and the last paragraph is poignant and beautifully written), but it's not enough to save the rest of the novel, which flounders under its own weight after an explosive beginning. Hyde tackles the big issues in her new novel, that's for sure; but the results are mixed. Not really recommended.