Customer Reviews

Beholden

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The wafer-thin plot is dragged out interminably - largely because the "male" narrator takes an inordinate length of time to read the "victim's" secret diary. Why? If he was that bothered he could've read it in one sitting. But no. And so, along the way, he all but describes the fluff in his navel. Dreary chapters after dreary chapter of his dull, little life are inserted ad nauseum.

I have a major problem with the "male" narrator. He is inauthentic. Or perhaps I should say he reads like a woman writing male - and not very well - which indeed he is. The novel might well have been more interesting if the narrator had been a lesbian. At least it would have given it a twist.

How this ever got published, gawd only knows. When we are told that publishers are overwhelmed by submissions and yet this hokum is the best they can come up with? Something is definately wrong somewhere!

I heard about this book at the World Mystery Convention in Toronto. Littleford was on a panel and she described the story. It sounded interesting enough that I picked up a copy a few months later. I wasn't disappointed. I finished the book in a few days. The plot is simple and compelling, and the portrait of a normal person being twisted by obsession and a desire to escape his mundane life was believably drawn. I picked up Littleford's second book (Death Duty) on the strength of this one.

Oh, and to the reviewer who said the book would have been better had the protagonist been a lesbian: If you'd read the book carefully, you might have realized that the turning point in the story (I won't spoil it by saying what it was) hinges on the main character being male. It would not have worked had he been a woman.