Trial by Fire: Also Known As Not That Kind of Place [Large Print] [Paperback]

Frances Fyfield (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1993

A novel featuring Crown Prosecutor Helen West and Detective Superintendent Geoffrey Bailey, the central characters of Fyfield's first novel "A Question of Guilt". The plot concerns a crime of passion in an Essex commuter village.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Fyfield is well on her way to challenging the P.D. James' of this world for crime supremacy." -The Toronto Sun

"One of the finest crime novelists around." -The Globe and Mail

"Thank God for Frances--. She reminds us that horror lurks beneath the surface of the most humdrum lives and that criminals are also human beings. -- She is now the Queen of the Psychological Thriller." -The Evening Standard

--This text refers to the Unbound edition.

From the Inside Flap

A woman's body is found decomposing in a shallow grave, stab wounds to the neck and blows to the head and shoulders. She is identified as Yvonne, missing wife of local property developer John Blundell. When Antony Sumner, English teacher and Yvonne's lover, confesses to striking her down with his walking stick, it looks like an open and shut case for Detective Superintendent Geoffrey Bailey. Too much so thinks Crown Prosecutor Helen West. Sumner denies murder - and where is the knife? And when Helen and Geoffrey dig deeper into the secrets of the sleepy commuter village what they discover is a hidden world of passion, envy and betrayal. --This text refers to the Unbound edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 270 pages
• Publisher: John Curley & Assoc; Lrg edition (January 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0792711742
• ISBN-13: 978-0792711742
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,425,517 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars a matter of taste, December 20, 2006

By 

M.K. "reads and writes" (West Hartford, CT, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Trial By Fire Pb (Paperback)

everything the other reviewer didn't like, I did. the inner world of the characters is rich and interesting. yes, they do go on about not being married, but that's because it was a shoved in their faces all the time in the strange community they'd settled in.

Sure some of the story wasn't absolutely part of the plot, but it added to the portrait of the people. I even enjoyed the totally unnecessary description of a trainride to London.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars First in a series curse, February 2, 2006

By 

MJS "Constant Reader" (New York, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Trial By Fire Pb (Paperback)

This is the sort of book that makes me believe any "first in a series" book is bound to be overburdened with exposition, backstory and more backstory. Then I remember glorious examples like Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and The Game of Kings and remember what a little restraint can do. A reader shouldn't be sick to death of the heroine and hero of a mystery novel let alone a series by chapter 3 but that's exactly where this one left me. Helen West comes across as a self-absorbed, self-satisfied jerk. Geoffrey Bailey fares slightly better though add in the wimp factor and he's similarly unwelcome by page 50 or so. The mystery itself is interesting enough and might have been quite good had the author spent more time on the victim, the suspect, their friends and family instead of droning on about Helen, her boyfriend (not her husband as we're told a dozen times per chapter!) and equally annoying policewoman Amanda.

None of the characters is particularly likable which makes for a tiring read. And they can barely tolerate each other. West and Bailey feel superior to the family that owns the pub. Bailey feels superior to his subordinate Amanda. West feels superior to pretty much everyone else in town and certainly to every established institution. And we're treated to a ringside seat on all this because West and Bailey's internal monologues fill page after page.

The ending, however, is what made me yearn to slap these two. An "innocent" is killed, a man was wrongly accused, someone is fired and lives are damaged all around. But despite escaping unharmed except for a dirty jacket, West and Bailey whine and whine and whine to themselves and each other. It's all about them. They feel guilty. They feel disillusioned. They are oppressed by life in the 'burbs. They need a new place to live.

They need to get a grip.