Customer Reviews

A Place of Hiding

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(34)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(23)

 

 

I think it says it all when a reader whose favourite author is Elizabeth George can't finish this book. That's me. I have been really trying to go past half-way, where it was, actually, a struggle to get, for a couple of weeks and gave up. No need to analyse the reasons - just the fact that I had been amazed by most of her earlier novels (especially captivated by Deception in his Mind), put her up in my Favourite author box but couldn't read this one is enough. It could be the lack of Helen and Lynley and Barbara, it could be the setting that was depressing, it could be the length, but mostly, it was just boring. The characters were boring, not shallow nor undeveloped. They were simply not interesting. I just didn't care to find out why and how that person died. It's really such a pity, because Ms. George can do so much with her characters and has such a lovely style of writing. I don't know what happened here, but I'm so disappointed.

I have to confess I was rather disappointed with "A Place of Hiding." Perhaps it was because Barbara Havers (my favourite character in the series that Elizabeth George has created) did not make even one appearance in this installment; or perhaps it was because the novel seem to completely lack any kind of suspense (esp in comparison to Ms George's first Lynely/Havers outing, "A Great Deliverance" -- a truly superb mystery novel, that); or because it took forever for the novel to unwind and move forward. For whatever reason, "A Place of Hiding" just did not live up to my expectations.

When an old friend (Cherokee Rivers) from Deborah St. James's past turns up at the St. James' doorstep begging for help, Deborah (and Simon, her husband and a forensic scientist) can hardly turn the poor man away. It turns out that Cherokee's sister, China, has been accused of murdering Guy Brouard on an isolated beach at Guersey (an island in the English Channel). Deborah is sure that her old friend is incapable of murder and is all for rushing off to prove her friend's innocence. But Simon is not so sure about the Rivers siblings, or about just what he and Deborah can really accomplish. And when it turns out that there are actually witnesses who saw China following Guy that fateful morning, both Simon and Deborah realize that its not going to be all that easy a task proving China's innocence. Finding a motive for this seemingly motiveless murder would be the first obvious step. And when the St. Jameses discover that Guy was not that well liked and that he had his fair share of enemies (two ex-wives, three estranged children, and a host of people he seems to have let down in one way or another), it looks as if the first steps have been taken to establishing that there may have been other suspects besides China. But Simon cannot let go of the notion that either one or both the Rivers siblings were involved in the murder, and his suspicions are beginning to take a toll on his relationship with Deborah. Will Simon be able to deal with his suspicions about the Rivers siblings (as well as his jealousy about Deborah's bond with them)? Or will his feelings get in the way of the investigation?

The main problem with "A Place of Hiding" (for me anyway) was that it took too long to unwind. The actual motive for the murder was not revealed until a little less than three quarters way through the novel (true there were a few other probable motives strewn about, but the authour, in my opinion, failed to focus on them concretely enough that it was hard to take these 'motives' seriously). And then there was the fact that the book seemed to be absolutely full of characters, whose every action was observed, dissected, picked through and presented for the readers pleasure. And some of these characters weren't even all that essential to the plot! After a while I just started skimming in order to get to the 'meat' of the mystery!!

So, if you like your mystery novels dense, where every shift in shadow and where every shade of a particular character's motivation is described, then "A Place of Hiding" should indeed satisfy. But is you're looking for a clever and suspenseful mystery novel, then you might want to give this latest Elizabeth George offering a miss.

A change from her previous novels, Elizabeth George brings two of her secondary characters, Simon and Deborah St. James, into the forefront. Thomas Lynley and Lady Helen make a brief appearance in the beginning of the novel. Barbara Havers does not appear at all.

The setting for Elizabeth George's newest novel is the English Channel island of Guernsey. Americans, Cherokee River and his sister China, act as courier's of a set of architectural plans to be transported to Guernsey per the request of businessman Guy Brouard. Guy is building a museum to honor Guernseymen who resisted Nazi occupation. Shortly after the Rivers' arrival in Guernsey, Guy is found murdered. China is arrested. One rainy night Deborah St. James opens her front door and there is River requesting her help. Deborah was China's roommate for her soul-searching three-year stay in California. Deborah feels a debt toward China and enlists her unwilling husband, Simon St. James, to aid the quest for the truth. What ensues is richly complex, multi-layered psychological drama. Sometimes it is too complex and too mult-layered.

There were a couple of problems with the book. There are an excessive number of characters. Some are simply not needed. The book was over 500 pages and it tended to ramble on quite a bit in the middle, which it a lumbering pace. The plot relied a little too heavily on misdirection that made certain elements confusing. It's still a pretty good book, but if you are Elizabeth George fan don't expect this to be one of her best.

No Havers and Lynley and, as everyone has noted, Deborah and Simon St. James are uninteresting characters: she whines, he patronizes. The plot is pedestrian and, for George, uncharacteristically banal -- a terminally ill old ladies and her ammoral old rake of the brother, both victimized and permanently scarred by the Holocaust; Deborah and St. James scarred by insecurity and a bad automobile accident that left him crippled; Cherokee and China, victimized by their neglectful mother (a rabid environmentalist who abandoned them for the trees; a poor abused teenager -- I mean, even the little dog gets kicked around in this book.

I am a fan of Elizabeth George and had eagerly awaited her new novel. While I can't call myself a victim -- I read it, after all -- I certainly feel neglected. Bring back Havers and Lynley! Bring back Helen!

Unless you're a die-hard George fan (pun intended), you might do well to skip this one.

This book goes from WWII to the Guernsey Islands, makes brief stops in London, and then heads back to the Islands again. All this location hopping simply pads out a story that could have been told better. George is known, or has been known, for her tightly-knit plots and well-drawn major and minor characters.

This story, however, just meanders all over the place. Instead of introducing aspects of people and places that lead to a conclusion, there are various subplots (the aged WWII collaborator, Paul's loutish older brother) that add nothing to the book except extra pages.

Plus, the use of Deborah as the main focus was a horrendous choice. Every time she has appeared before, she's been whiny and unfocused, always attempting to define herself by external means. This book is no exception. In "Missing Joseph", it's because she can't have children. In "APoH", she's all upset because she gave a gallery showing that was rained out, and her pictures failed to set the art world on fire. Poor baby.

Throughout the rest of the book, she crowbars herself into the investigation, acts like a complete spoiled child to the point of possibly contaminating evidence, and continually whines about how everyone treats her as a child. Frankly, if I were Simon, I would have sent her packing rather than let her continue to make a hash of everything - and told her to grow the heck up in the bargain.

The book claims to be a mystery, but large chunks are centered around Deborah and her problems, and it drags the book horribly each time EG has Deborah attempt any type of introspection because Deborah is just too shallow and uninteresting.

Please, please bring back Lynley and Havers in the next book.

I was terribly disappointed in this book and that's bad because I didn't like the last one as much as I'd hoped either. I'm beginning to question my devotion to the inhabitants of George's imaginary London world.

Perhaps I'm in a literary rut but I like to read about the clever and dashing Tommy Lynley and the realistically complex Barbara Havers. I like the other constables (Webberly, et al) and I enjoy St. James' contributions to the plot twists, too, but I should have known that a book with the whiny and self-absorbed Deborah as protagonist would not satisfy me.

I find that George's upper class female characters are not as inherently interesting as the grittier, working-class Havers. Their lives, so privileged and easy, so lacking in actual achievement, seem petty when compared to Havers' struggle to define herself as a woman professional in a man's field, while still clutching tightly to the traditional woman's role, namely caring for her elderly and infirm parents. I admire and enjoy the raw honesty of Havers' internal struggles as she makes her choice every day about how much time and energy she can afford to devote to two competing, nearly opposite, responsibilities. Additionally, I love her fierce devotion to her values and principals, her strength of character in the face of adversity, and her tightly constricted, yet aching to burst, heart. She's probably among my favorite contemporary female characters and deserves another story of her own. Next to her, many other women pale to beige.

Deborah is one of these. As a peripheral character, Deborah is fine, adding a pretty atmosphere and sexual tension to the loving, yet tortured, relationship between Simon and Tommy, but I cannot identify with her self-obsessed whinging. It's hard to feel sorry for a woman who feels brutalized by life merely because she doesn't get whatever she wants whenever she wants it. Lots of women long for families and struggle to make their professional mark, yet few can afford to indulge in such navel-gazing in Cheyne Walk. Most, like Havers and Deborah's art school friend China Rivers, must get up and hustle to work every day. Deborah freely admits that observers might find it hard to feel sorry for her, as she bears no financial responsibility for her own or anyone else's support, and can shoot only what she likes (ten thousand developed images as she searches for her own perspective) as she has no clients to please, as China has. Despite these observations of her obvious privileges, she wallows, envying China's professional interests and status, but unwilling to pay the emotional and financial price for artistic freedom, as China has.

Deborah hasn't the strength of personality to front a novel, even one with as ephemeral a plot as this one, in which Deborah, nearly single-handedly, discovers who murdered a manipulative rich man and framed China for it. Maybe I've read too many of these, but it wasn't as hard as I'd hoped to figure out who done it. The novel lacked the sparkle and punch of George's earlier work. The main internal conflict comes from Deborah's unhappiness with the way the courtly Simon treats her, not from the pangs of her own confused, yet determined, desire to grow into a self-actualized woman. The external class-conflict that George brings to life so vividly between Tommy and Havers is dimly recalled by the obvious class differences between Deborah and China. Unfortunately, these conflicts aren't examined closely enough for anyone (including the reader) to learn anything. No one takes a stand, no one overcomes prejudices, no one develops as a character: everyone stands around and means well but nothing really happens, except. . . Deborah goes home to reinvent herself again.

Worst novel of the lot. In this novel I was left wondering why Simon didn't uncerimoneously dump his tiresome twit of a wife (Deborah St. James). The novels about Barbara Havers are by far the best. I am waiting for a new one.

Scotland Yard consultant forensic expert Simon Allcourt-St. James and his pretty, passionate, and perpetually pouting wife, Debra, journey to the island of Guernsey off the Channel coast of Britain to free Debra's childhood friend, China Rivers, who has been arrested for murdering Guy Brouard, elderly wealthy habitant of Guernsey whose sexual appetite borders kinkily on the pedophilic. The unravelling of the "mystery" is middling-satisfying for Elizabeth George fans, and I won't go into that for fear of unleashing a spoiler. Equally interesting is George's illuminating a part of the world that many, or most of us, know very little about. Overall, however, I can only give the book an unenthusiastic three stars.

From the opening page, we are pummeled with character upon character who share the one trait: being miserable. China is miserable. China's brother, Cherokee, is miserable. The two taunt each other at how even more miserable the one sibling is than the other. A mother is referred to throughout the book but is never seen, as seeing her would contribute to China's misery level in a negative way. Simon is sorry to have to go to Guernsey on the mission of mercy (though he summons a stiff upper lip as always); Debra of course is miserable because her husband, who is after all a policeman of sorts and must walk over coals to pull off the politics of an unauthorized "hobbyist" investigation abroad, is actually trying to solve the crime, rather than simply trying to get out of jail by hook or crook a strange, moody American woman whom he virtually does not know from Eve. The island of course is populated by sad, mean-spirited ugly people who are miserable. As always, George's depiction of food is stomach-turning, quite a contrast to other English mystery writers (Christie and above all Ian Fleming) who write delightfully about food. Then again, George spends her time in Southern California and England so how poetic about grub can she wax?

It took 160 pages for the action to kick, a clear motive was never established, and not only was Inspector Thomas Lynley essentially absent, but his sidekick, Barbara Havers--who to many is the star of the series--merits nary a reference. Still, Elizaeth George writes better than the rest of the pack and if you've kept the faith thus far, you won't be unreasonably let down by this, 12th, installment. Note to author: bring back Havers, okay?

I've just returned from a trip to the island of Guernsey in the English Channel, and I'm still lost in the world I found there. I was in the company of a couple that has remained fascinating through most of the books this author has written: Deborah and Simon St. James. They introduced me to a new set of acquaintances that proved challenging. The author gave me the human condition --- the lies we live; the masks we wear; the sorrows, triumphs, accomplishments and disasters we humans encounter. This trip into the pages of "A Place of Hiding" was less about a police investigation, less about a murder, and more about the "why" of murder. This story is not a techno-thriller, no police procedural, nor a non-stop, page-turning chase. It is about what people do and why they do it......
It's a great book. I loved it....

I have been an Elizabeth George fan for years, but I have finally learned my lesson, and I will never rush to buy her books in hardcover again. This book was a slow and sometimes painful read. Too much attention was devoted to flesh out subplots that were never resolved and characters with only an incidental relationship to the main plot. At least I think it was the main plot. It's impossible to make specific criticisms without spoiling the plot, so let me just say that I was disappointed that separate plots were not brought together but left to lumber off in different directions. The focus on Deborah was unfortunate, as Deborah is the weakest of George's main characters, and this novel did nothing to redeem her from her constant whining. Simon and Deborah's relationship also seemed different than it was characterized in "A Suitable Vengeance," which I found odd. My biggest problem with the novel was none of the above, amazingly enough. My biggest problem was that I found the motivation for the crime being investigated totally unconvincing, and the behavior of many of the main characters unbelieveable. Luckily Deborah Crombie has a new novel due soon. I discovered her a few years ago, and her novels have filled the gap left by my disappointment in Elizabeth George's recent novels.