Customer Reviews

In a Child's Eye

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Wilson's dialog is stunning at times -- he catches the rhythms and patterns of the way people actually speak -- and his clever solution really does surprise. Too bad that his climax is cheesily movie-ish and his resolution pat. An effectively developed romantic subplot is abandoned 2/3rds of the way through the book and is left unresolved at the end. Still, a clever concept, a clever unraveling, and much excellent writing in between.

It has taken Carol Halstead fifteen years to cope with the childhood trauma that has scarred her life. A week before Christmas, four teens invaded her home and murdered her parents while the eight-year-old Carol watched from her hiding place. No one was charged with the brutal crime.

Though she has never forgotten and Christmas has never been the same, Carol is starting her new life as an elementary school teacher. However, one of the students, Ben, seems eerily familiar. Ben seems to be the catalyst, triggering nightmares that leave Carol in a state of terror and dread. Is Ben's father one of the killers or is Carol's subconscious playing mind games with her?

IN A CHILD'S EYE mixes Freudian theories of the subconscious mind (though much of the theories are currently out of style) with the British cozy in a psychological thriller. Though Carol is brilliantly developed as a warm, vulnerable protagonist, the storyline has one too mmany sidebars and sub-plots that only serve to diffuse the potential tension of the novel. This is a shame because when Tim Wilson sticks with his well designed and written premise, readers have a great novel that should have been about 200 pages in length. Readers, who want to peruse a good psychological thriller, will quickly know what pages to skip because they are so bland, especially when compared to the main plot which is dynamic, pulsating and electric in scope.

Harriet Klausner