Customer Reviews

Mary, Mary

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I just completed Mary, Mary, and I had to take the day off in order to finish it. This book is absorbing. The characters are unique and well drawn, the reader really gets to know them. The plot is full of twists, which kept me in total suspense. I highly recommend this book to fans of Minette Walters, and Ruth Rendell. Julie Parsons has done and excellent job. I am looking forward to her next book.

I found this book rivetting. Normally I would not read a psycho-thriller such as this, but on the advice of a friend I picked it up, and subsequently could not put it down. This work is a well crafted piece of literature with attention to detail and build-up of characters I found fascinating. Ms. Parsons is a keen student of humanity, especially those on the edge of reality. One can feel the frustration and pain of Margaret, a mother torn by the abduction and brutal murder of her only daughter when she returns home to Ireland from New Zealand. I found the volley between past and present a twist that was most intriguing. This is certainly the stuff box-office hits are made of. No hesitation at all of recommending this excellent read!

Fans of Elizabeth George's novels will love this book. It is a harrowing exploration of the psyches of both the perpetrator and the victims of a sadistic crime. The author interweaves three or four plot lines concerning the victim's mother and grandmother, an alcoholic policeman and other characters skillfully and seamlessly. "Mary, Mary" is not a "whodunit" and it is not a conventional mystery. Not only does the author deal with a crime of terrible cruelty and its aftermath, but she also shines a light on the secrets that we keep from ourselves and from others. Parsons shows how these secrets fester and poison our relationships; they sometimes destroy our lives. This is not a "feel-good" book, but for a first novel, it is an extraordinary achievement.

I found the main character so peculiar, so emotionally inaccessible that it was impossible to be sympathetic to her. The plot is interesting, but the book just lacked something. Perhaps because the character is a psychiatrist explains her once-removed quality from everything and everyone. Through the brutal murder of her daughter, the search for the killer, and the revelation of her life's secrets, she (and we) learn that she and her daughter didn't know who the other really was. Just as she and her own mother didn't know each other. I guess this book is a mystery, but there was nothing thrilling or suspenseful about it. It's more about secrets and lies than about madness and murder.

Amid some of the rave reviews here I would like to add a note of caution. This is not a great thriller for me - maybe I prefer stronger stuff - but this novel has very little that will live on in the memory. Perhaps if you like some of the female authors mentioned you might like this, but to say that this book was a great success in the British Isles is wildly overstating the case.

When I began this novel, I thought it was fantastic! The characters were very well developed and the plot caught my attention right away. How ever as the story developed, I lost interest in the main characters, and found that the ending was underwhelming. It seemed as if Parsons was rushing to tie up the loose ends, and I knew what was going to happen about half way through the book. I would have liked to know more about Margaret and the others, and I was left unsatisfied at the end. Having read all of Ruth Rendell, Elizabeth George, and Minette Walters, to name a few favorites, the author still has a long way to go to be put in the same category as these great authors.

A literate, well-plotted, fascinating thriller -- and there are so very few of them being published these days. RIchly characterized, mesmerizing to read. See her other novel "The Courtship Gift" as well for another fine book

I opened this book expecting your basic cheap thriller, which I love. But so much more was here. A cool woman. A truly despicable crime. And perfect justice. More than a thriller, it is a novel worth the page turning. Worth the thinking about.

Julie Parsons first novel, "Mary, Mary," is a taut, carefully crafted psychological thriller. It takes the reader through the devastating emotional havoc of a mother whose only child, Mary, is brutally raped and murdered by a psychotic killer in Dublin, Ireland. The mother's pain, and finally her surprising and just revenge at the end of the story, are powerfully described. Dublin, the city and the sea around it, provides the backdrop for the action of the novel. The mother's life (she is a psychiatrist who has left Ireland to create a successful career in New Zealand) and her relationship to her own dying mother, her child, and her former lover is gripping in its intensity. Ms. Parsons' insights into the minds of her characters are acute and powerful. This is a first rate novel, a page turner, a sensitive look at the widening circle of tragedy wrought by the sick and damaged mind of a psychotic young man, loose on the streets of Ireland.

I was expecting this to be a can't put down thriller. However, I found it boring and too long. It's really two stories, Mary's murder and the unexciting investigation leading to the killer's capture, and then the trial and its aftermath. I never came to care for the main character, Mary's mother, and found much of her behavior in the first half unbelievable. The ending is not a surprise and neither of the stories is exciting. And there's way too much reminiscing (much of it repetitive) and lyrical description.