The Stolen Heart: A Novel of Suspense [Hardcover]

Lauren Kelly (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 14, 2005

Sixteen years ago, a vivacious fifth-grade classmate of Merilee Graf was abducted from a park in Mt. Olive, New York. Haunted by the memory of the 11-year-old “gypsy-looking” girl whose disappearance has never been explained, Merilee returns home to keep a vigil at the bedside of her dying father, a prosperous importer of exotic goods and a former, popular mayor of the upstate New York city on the Chautauqua River. After Mr. Graf’s death, Merilee finds herself an “heiress” in more way than one as she becomes involved, with both dread and fascination, with two very different men from her Mt. Olive past -- the older brother of her missing classmate and her own “Uncle Jedah,” executor of her father’s estate. Past and present mysteries converge in a revelation too painful, and too shocking, for Merilee to accept, and in a sudden act of reckless courage she frees herself of the terrifying obsessions of the past.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Kelly (Take Me, Take Me with You), a pseudonymous "best-selling and award-winning author," serves up a studiously stylized novel about sex, abuse and grief that's oddly compelling while also being overwrought and exasperatingly repetitive. Narrated by Merilee Graf, the 26-year-old only child of a successful importer of exotic goods in Mount Olive, N.Y., the story flashes back and forth between Merilee's hazy recollections of the past (when she was 10, her "colored" fifth-grade classmate Lilac Jimson vanished) and the present (Merilee returns home to attend to her dying father). Lilac's disappearance disturbs Merilee anew when she bumps into Lilac's older brother, Roosevelt, in the hospital; Roosevelt had been the recipient of a Police Academy scholarship donated by Merilee's father as well as a brief high school obsession of Merilee's. Later, after her father's death, Merilee is hysterical about the loss of a glass heart she'd given him, but entranced by her mysterious Uncle Jedah, her father's right-hand man and now the executor of the estate she's inherited. Readers know some dark and terrible secret connecting Lilac's disappearance and Merilee's father or uncle will be uncovered, but Merilee's such an ineffectual person it's hard to imagine she'll figure out what she needs to in time. Bottom line: overheated and creepy. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Lauren Kelly is one pseudonym of Joyce Carol Oates, a recipient of the National Book Award and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction. Oates's most recent novel, The Falls, was a New York Times Notable Book, a Washington Post Best Book of 2004, and a Chicago Tribune Top Ten Book of 2004. She is the Roger S. Berlind Distinguished Professor of Humanities at Princeton University and has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 1978. In 2003 she was a recipient of the Commonwealth Award for Distinguished Service in Literature. In 2005 she was awarded France's Prix Femina for The Falls.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Ecco; First Edition edition (June 14, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060797282
• ISBN-13: 978-0060797287
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,824,423 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A character study that examines the darker side of people, September 1, 2005

By 

Bookreporter (New York, New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Stolen Heart: A Novel of Suspense (Hardcover)

SEARCH CONTINUES FOR MISSING MT. OLIVE GIRL...FEW LEADS IN SEARCH FOR 11-YEAR-OLD...ABDUCTION CASE IN FOURTH WEEK. NO RANSOM DEMANDS.

Merilee Graf has a lot of baggage left over from childhood, including the nagging mystery of what happened to her fifth-grade classmate. When Lilac Jemson went missing, the adults of Mt. Olive took pains to shield the other children from learning about it --- Merilee's parents among them; in fact, more fervently than most. They avoided talking about it at all costs. To mention it or ask why Lilac wasn't around anymore sent them into a near rage. Why all the secrecy?

Sixteen years passed, and Lilac didn't surface. But Merilee never forgot about her. Now, Merilee returns to her hometown. Her father is gravely ill and she grapples with residual conflicting emotions. Did her father ever really love her? Sometimes he seemed so cold. She believes she was never the daughter he wanted, as her mother was never the wife he wanted. Yet he could --- could --- act warm and caring. Merilee was definitely a daddy's girl, while her mother embarrassed her, sometimes to the point that she wished her mother gone, dead, out of her life. Edith Graf had had some heavy emotional issues to deal with. She was always there for Merilee --- at least until her early demise --- but preoccupied with her own problems for the most part. Was Merilee too harsh in her judgment of her?

While her father lies listless in the local hospital, Merilee brings him personal treasures from the family home, including a heart-shaped magnifying glass that she bought for him one day. It was a special gift, chosen with painstaking care. But he seems less attached to it than she. For her, it is a symbol with a dual meaning, and, when she discovers it's missing after he dies, her mission to find out who took it becomes near obsession. Even the hospital staff starts to grow somewhat hostile toward her endless inquiries about it.

In her search for the missing heart, Merilee reconnects with a brief flame from her past, Roosevelt Jemson --- Lilac's brother. Over a decade and a half later, he still piques her curiosity. What once might have been fizzled before it got started, now they both have some lingering feelings to deal with over it.

Meanwhile, Jedah Graf, Merilee's "uncle," arrives for the funeral services. Never her favorite, Merilee finds herself repulsed and intrigued at the same time. But considering the majority of her relatives, her attraction to Jedah --- a slick, manipulative, but often comforting presence --- might be understandable. Plus, she is weakened by the devastation in the wake of her loss. While Merilee is working through her grief, secrets surface --- secrets no one who has just lost a father should have to face.

Masterfully written, THE STOLEN HEART is not your typical mystery. It's in large part a character study, with a look at the dark side of people. That's no surprise, though, when you discover that "Lauren Kelly" is a pseudonym for Joyce Carol Oates.

--- Reviewed by Kate Ayers