Published by Simon & Schuster on November 12, 2013
A serial killer starves his victims before removing their testicles. Police Lieutenant Abe Goldberg's search for the killer takes him to the world of small town theater (which, in the Holloman, Connecticut of 1969, is surprisingly elaborate). Meanwhile, Sergeant Delia Carstairs is occupied with the Shadow Women, six missing women -- one disappearance each year for six years -- who rented apartments around the first of the year, lived isolated lives, then disappeared in late June, leaving behind a few articles of cheap clothing and a studio portrait. That investigation segues into the department's oldest open missing persons investigation (involving a female doctor who disappeared in 1925), which the star of the series, Carmine Delmonico, undertakes to solve.
Delia's new friends, Ivy Ramsbottom and Jessica Wainfleet, are given starring roles. Jessica is the director of an institute for the criminally insane who is famed for curing the raging psychopath Walter Jenkins. As an author should, Colleen McCullough devotes considerable time to character development. While Delia tends to be stuffy, judgmental, pretentious and dull, Carmine and Jessica are just pretentious and Abe is just dull. Fortunately, some of the supporting characters are more colorful. Nearly all of the characters, however, are so eloquent in their conversations (even when talking to themselves) as to detract from the novel's credibility. The characters are not necessarily inauthentic, but the dialog is. They speak with the same voice ... an annoying voice that often borders on the ridiculous. They are so determinedly chipper and witty and chummy and erudite that I wanted to strangle them every time they spoke -- and they are a loquacious bunch. The exceptions consist of absurdly stereotyped members of the underclass who speak a "ghetto" patois of the sort wildly imagined by someone who has never been exposed to that side of life.
McCullough's prose is generally fluid, which makes it surprising that occasional sentences are remarkably awkward while others smack of a forced attempt at literary excellence. Some aspects of the story are just whacky (Jenkins draws a bath for Jessica, finds her asleep in the tub, picks her up, towels her off, and carries her to her bed, all without waking her; Jenkins, as a trusted trustee in addition to bathtub filler notwithstanding his status as an insane serial killer, has been given access to all the confidential files of his fellow patients; Jenkins is allowed to help build the security system that confines him; Jenkins not only uses the hospital machine shop without supervision, he somehow has the technical expertise to build a complex device). Nothing about Jenkins' situation is credible -- an unfortunate lapse, since he plays such a key role as the plot develops.
Notwithstanding its flaws, the story has some entertainment value. One of the two investigations holds a few surprises even if some aspects of the plot eventually descend into silliness. Much of the novel is a celebration of female friendships, but the characters celebrate by having endless gossipy conversations, adding to the novel's tedium. Had the writing style (and particularly the dialog) been less irritating, this would have been a better book. As it stands, the novel's weaknesses offset the (mostly) appealing nature of its farfetched plot.
NOT RECOMMENDED