Devices and Desires

An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery: 8

ISBN: 1-55690-141-0 Order from: Recorded Books

A skillful, atmospheric, but significantly overwritten mystery with a plethora of ambivalent suspects and motives, jerky view-hopping, and several coincidents.

Reviewed by David on July 10, 2000

Genre: Mystery (Police Procedural, English Village)

Synopsis: This is an unabridged recording of Devices and Desires. Commander Dalgeliesh of Scotland Yard arrives at Larksoken on the Norfolk coast to dispose of property left to him by his late aunt. The cold, windy coast fits well with his melancholic, almost brooding recollections of past happiness and loss. However, the melancholy is interrupted by a serial murderer that preys on women. While not officially uninvolved in the investigation, Dalgliesh becomes an observer in the slow, painful investigation, as clues and crimes multiply, and affect Dalgliesh's neighbors and colleagues.

Full Review: The author displays an uncommon skill in this melancholic book, fitting the lonely, chilly coast alongside the pain and uncertainty of human emotion. As the many neighbors, and potential witnesses or suspects parade in this book, the reader vividly experiences both the weather and the "devices and desires" of the humanly imperfect villagers that may lead to murder.

The biggest problem of the book is excess. After the third or forth character is described in detail, with the painful past, and passionate if hidden present, the reader gets tired of emotional involvement. After some point in the book, one meets each new character with trepidation instead of anticipation, as an extended narration proceeds to paint the character's appearance, thoughts, childhood, hidden wounds and fears, and potential motives for homocide.

Another flaw lurks in a rather exotic intrigue towards the end of the book, which fits incongruously into the more domestic pattern of the rest of the novel.

Ultimately the mystery is resolved with deftness and constistency, and some amount of appropriate foreshadowing. However, it is frustrating that one needs to get through so much skillful but mostly futile diversion to traverse the relatively simple plot.

Overall: 5.5; Plot: 4.5; Characters: 5.5; Style: 6; World-building: 6; Originality: 5;

ISBN: 1-55690-141-0 Order from: Recorded Books