Customer Reviews

The Spring of the Tiger

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I started out by reading Victoria Holt's Road to Paradise Island. I had no idea I would like it so much so that I went to the library and started reading each one of Ms. Holt's books. Spring of the Tiger is one of my favorite. I liked it enough to buy a copy for myself so I can reread it in the future. This book doesn't have the kind of ending one gets used to reading about in a lot of the romance-fiction books, but that was what appealed to me. Too bad there are not many books left by Ms. Holt that I have not already read.

Another book my mom read to me when I was about 10 years old. This is a very well paced story which doesn't lag on detail and moves quickly (for a Victoria Holt book that is) Holt has an elegant writing style and no explict love scenes. She relies on good storylines and her characters are believable. Overall, I thought it was a great book and I don't want to post any spoilers but I'll just say I found the ending to be too intense. There are other Holt books I liked better but that's just my opinion. It was a powerful story and I enjoyed it.

I enjoyed reading this story, but it definitely wasn't the best Ms. Holt ever wrote. In all of her books, the culprit is fairly obvious, but somehow the unmasking of this villain came off a tad clumsily. For me, the fun of Ms. Holt's books is getting inside the heroine's mind and also just savoring the way the author creates a mood. She is great at setting up an isolated (and often impossibly romantic) situation for the heroine and the intricate plotting and phrasing used is enjoyable even when you are certain who the villain/villainess of the piece is.
In this book, Sarah Ashington, the heiress to the tea plantation, was not quite so likable as many other Holt heroines. She was whiny at times and a bit hysterical. The fact that she seemed to enjoy being brutalized by her bizarre husband bothered me as well. In addition, the secondary characters in this book were not so well-drawn. People for whom Sarah Ashington professed devotion were rather flat characters. Since the reader could not get a good picture of who these people were and why Sarah adored them, I just had to take her word for it. Still, this is an entertaining book to pass away an afternoon or two.

This is one of my favorite Victoria Holt novels! Sarah's mother is a famous actress that dies mysteriously. Sarah feels alone in the world, so she marries to escape a life of boredom with her aunts. When her father dies, she inherits his land in India, which just happens to be right by her new husbands'! She also finds out about a pearl necklace that her half sister inherits that seems to be trouble. After a while, she feels her life is in danger. Who is the suspect? Her husband!

I got so into this book that I stayed up half the night to finish it! Then, it took me the other half to recover from the shock of the end! I can't say anything more except READ THIS BOOK!!!

But please. How obvious is it who the culprit is? How come it's always the person the heroine trusts the most, or suspects the least. For once could one of the suspects have dunnit. It would actually, despite what the author may have thought, make it less predictable.